


Hawking the Headlines

by masterroadtripper



Series: Best We Can [7]
Category: Newsies - All Media Types, Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: Charlie being a big brother, Disabled Character, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Internalized Homophobia, Jack being a good person, Language Processing Disorder, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Regretful Morris, Sign Language, Slow Build, Specs being helpful, Spot and Race being adorable, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-13
Updated: 2020-05-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:26:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 35
Words: 44,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22234003
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/masterroadtripper/pseuds/masterroadtripper
Summary: No one knows who the Manhattan newsie that wears the grey striped shirt is.  He showed up a few months ago, but he never goes to Jacobi's and he doesn't board at the lodging house.Morris doesn't know why he can't talk or seem to understand what anyone is telling him.  He can't hawk the headline properly and he is ignored most of the time.Jack finally reaches out to the newsie in the striped shirt and learns that there is much more to the silent boy than meets the eye.
Relationships: Crutchie/Jack Kelly, Morris Delancey/Romeo, Spot Conlon/Racetrack Higgins
Series: Best We Can [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1555765
Comments: 100
Kudos: 128





	1. Slipping Through The Cracks (Jack and Spot)

Spot first saw the tall lanky kid climbing up one of the cranes at the docks while he was crossing the river to Manhattan. Usually, he wouldn’t bat an eyelash at the sight, but it was his cap that caught Spot’s attention. It was a newsboy cap, a sign of the trade. So, of course, Spot was at least a little curious, but he really had no time to waste inquiring after a kid who’d decided to climb a crane. Spot had to get to talking with Jack sooner than later, and maybe, just maybe, follow Race out on a fire escape after…who knows?

The second time he saw the tall boy, he realized that he was actually much taller than Spot had initially realized. And thinner too. But mostly just tall. Spot had never had the height to use in his favour but this boy seemed like he more so just wanted to hide behind a lamppost than actually have to interact with anyone to sell any papers. He huffed but didn’t make himself known from the shadows he was hiding in. The boy had his papers stacked at his feet, cap tugged low over his eyes, wringing his hands and tapping his foot frantically against the curb. Yeah, that one was a little odd.

The third time he saw the tall newsie, he was headed towards the docks again. For all of Spot’s watching and listening, he still had no idea who this boy was. No one ever talked about him, this unknown newsie. No one mentioned the boy in the striped shirt who couldn’t hold still to save his life. Spot wanted to know more but it simply wasn’t his turf. Sure, the strike let their areas overlap a little more than usual and he’d become friends with Davey and Jack, and...more, much more, with Race, it simply wasn’t his place to go making inquiries.

* * *

Jack wasn’t exactly sure the first time he’d seen the boy in the stripes hawking papers. He never stayed at the lodging house with them, never came to Jacobi’s during lunch hour, never even spoke to anyone. If his memory served him right, Stripes - as Jack had taken to calling him in his head - had been around for a few months already though. Yet, no matter who he asked, no one knew anything about Stripes other than he was never at the distribution yard when the gates opened at either time of day, that he never could hold still, and that he could be seen climbing the Pier 11 crane on a regular basis.

He was a Manhattan newsie though, there was no doubt about it. He hawked papers for The World. Not the Post, not the Brooklyn Eagle. As well, he had not a speck of red in his clothes, the mark of Brooklyn. Stripes wore all grey, all the time. From his hat to his boots, Stripes was one monotone colour. Jack noticed that he would keep the brim of his hat pulled down low during sunny days and often looked away from people dressed in bright colours as if he’d looked at the sun itself.

And he seemed to have a fundamental misunderstanding of how to sell papers. Not once had he heard Stripes’ voice. The boy just stood near the curb, tapping his foot against it repeatedly and wringing his hands. Jack figured the kid made his bucks from pity. Maybe he couldn’t read, maybe he was a mute, Jack had yet to figure it out. Whatever was going on in that head of his, he was unique and there was no question about that.

There was really only one way to find out what was going on, Jack figured. Stripes had managed to slip through the cracks and Jack had never been able to learn about him nor offer him a bed at the lodging house and it had been a couple of months. He’d have to go talk to him. Or, try to talk to him. Who knows what would happen if someone actually did talk to him.

* * *

“So, what do youse know ‘bout tha’ newsie tha’ climbs them dock cranes?” Spot asked one afternoon that Race had come across to Brooklyn over lunch instead of going to Jacobi’s. It was usually a twice-a-week event that they’d crossover to each other and spend the entire afternoon together. Two afternoons a week - and two evenings a week if morning selling had been fruitful - wasn’t much, but the more they were seen around each other, the more people would start asking questions. Questions that there was no way Spot could answer truthfully without putting the both of them in grave danger.

“Tall one in the striped shirt?” Race asked as if there was more than one newsie that climbed a crane every day.

“Ya, him. What’s up wif tha’ kid anyways?” Spot continued, swinging his legs a little from where the two of them were sitting on the railing of the Brooklyn Bridge, just enjoying the breeze.

“Don’ really knows,” Race replied, flicking a cigar butt over the railing and spending it tumbling down into the river below, “Neva says nuffing to no one. Don’ even know ‘is name.”

“Why ‘asn’t Jack done anyfing ‘bout his crane climbin’ habit?” Spot wondered out loud, “There's aint no way tha’ is safe.”

“Probably ‘as thought ‘bout sayin’ somefing,” Race said, his voice soundly a little defensive, “But I ‘ighly doubt tha’ he’d listen or actually say anyfing back.”

“Was jus’ curious,” Spot muttered, looking out down the Manhattan side of the river at the cranes. He wasn’t sure if his eyes were deceiving him or not, but he could have sworn he saw the newsie in question up on top of one again.

* * *

After a week - with Charlie’s help - Jack was fairly sure that he’d figured out Stripes’ pattern. The only piece of the puzzle he was missing was where he got his papers from because he was never around when the distribution gate opened yet he always had a stack of papers at his feet. He wondered if the kid could even read, because the few times that he’d heard Stripes say anything in the past week, it was the wrong headline and often made no sense. Jack had so many questions.

Exactly a week after he and Charlie had started following Stripes, Jack decided that he was going to try to talk to him. As the noon bell rang, he saw the tall boy trying and failing to collect his unsold papers and tuck them back into his bag. His hands were shaking, to begin with, and just got worse with every paper that he fumbled onto the ground. It was as good a time as any and Jack confidently walked over to him.

“Hey kid, youse need a ‘and?” Jack asked as he got close, heard the shuffle of Charlie following him, both of them with empty paper bags and their caps on their heads.

Instead of replying, the kid looked up fast at Jack, his face a mixture of confusion and fear. Jack briefly wondered if the kid even spoke English. He wouldn’t be the first newsie that Davey and Elmer had had to teach a new language.

“Lets get those papes gatha’ed up, ya?” Charlie added from behind him, the blond newsie stepping forwards and simply starting to pick up the spilled papers as if to show Stripes what they meant. Slowly, Stripes seemed to catch on, shaking out of his frozen state and helping them load the papes up.

That was when Jack noticed that he was holding a paper with yesterday’s headline on it. He could work with that. The kid had day-old papers, obviously without enough money to buy the current papers, and aside from that, up close, he noticed that he had holes big enough to show a couple of toes in either shoe and really, nothing he was wearing fit.

Suddenly, Jack felt extremely guilty. How had he let Stripes slide under his radar so easily? This kid - he was truly just a kid, no older than Charlie - needed help and no one had noticed for months. Jack wondered how he even managed to make enough money to survive.


	2. Noises of The Noon Hour (Morris)

Morris was furious. He was mad at the world, he was mad at his head, he was mad at a world that made no sense to him. He couldn’t sell his papers without being able to hawk the headline. He couldn’t hawk the headline because he couldn’t make any real words. He got pity money from the business people, and, while money was money, he wished he was like the other newsies. They were convincing, they were quick and they made good money it seemed.

He heard the noon bell ring above him and Morris let go of the breath he was holding. He would go out to the docks and rest. He could have a break. A break from the muddled noise and confusing words he heard all day but could make no sense of. Maybe he should just give up sneaking around and just go back to help at the distribution yard. But then, he’d never be able to make enough money to leave his uncle. He needed to be a newsie, no matter how hard it was.

Trying to pack up his sack, the noises of noon hour got louder and louder, ringing through his head and breaking any guise of concentration. His hands shook as he dropped the first pile of papers, half of them landing in his bag, the other half landing on the sidewalk. Morris stomped his foot in frustration but refused to cry out. There was no more attention that he needed to be drawn towards him than there already was. He didn’t need anyone to recognize him. Then he dropped another stack, barely any of the papers actually landing in the bag.

That was when he heard someone speak to him, not at him. While the words were no more clear in his head than they ever had been, it did cause Morris to look up at them. Forcing himself to stop shaking, he saw that they were newsies as well. Quickly, he looked back down, tugging his cap low over his eyes. He’d be recognized for certain if they saw his entire face now. He’d likely sold these newsies papers just this morning.

In the second he’d looked up, he already recognized the two that were standing there. They were famous newsies. Jack and Crutchie. Of course. The inseparable duo. The duo that Morris had torn apart during the strike. His stomach dropped at the memory. He was deceiving them. He was tricking them And yet, here they were, helping him. Helping him clean up the mess he’d made at his feet.

Then the two boys passed him his bag of papers, said something to him while motioning for him to follow. Morris looked from them to the docks and back. He only had a couple of hours before he had to be back at the yard for evening distribution, and he wasn’t allowed to go back out after that. If he missed his break now, he wouldn’t get one for the rest of the evening.

Morris shook his head ‘no,’ before pointing towards the docks and waving goodbye. He knew he was being skittish, but he’d flown under the radar of the Manhattan newsies for months now. And of course, his first proper interaction with them was with the leader and his right-hand-man, who he’d beaten up just weeks ago. They couldn’t find out.

Thankfully, the docks weren’t too far from where he’d set up that morning, and he waved hello to the crane operator on Pier 11, who was just walking out the gates, heading for his own lunch break. It was his other uncle’s old crane. His father was one of three boys. Though, Uncle Jeremy had died in a pier accident when Morris was twelve. Mom had died months later in a factory accident, and then dad left. That was when he and Oscar were left with Uncle Weisel. But before Uncle Jeremy died, he’d let Morris climb up his crane to get a view, high above the city. When Uncle Jeremy was replaced, the new operator let him climb still.

That was how Morris realized that he liked the quiet that being up so high afforded him. Noise frustrated Morris. As far as he understood, everyone but him could understand what everyone else was saying. But not him. Not a single sound out of anyone’s mouth made even a lick of sense to him and, while he assumed he could make the same sounds, his father, Uncle Weisel and Oscar told him that the words he did speak made no sense. He could copy the sounds, but he had no idea what they meant.

Luckily, his father could write and read, so - before he left him and Oscar with Weisel - he took a gamble and taught Morris how to write when it became obvious he would never speak. That was how he communicated with people, most of the time. Around Oscar, they now had gestures that they could speak with. Hand motions that only the two of them could understand. Most of the time, they would spend their time together in complete silence after a day of loud noise.

That was why Morris liked it at the top of his uncle's crane so much. It was quiet and the only sounds were the wind whistling by and water lapping at the pier below. And during lunch break, he could climb up there and give his head a break. Which he desperately needed right about now. It had been a long morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Imagine this, one day you wake up and everyone you've ever known is now speaking Czech. You know they're speaking to you, you know they're asking you something, but you don't know what they're actually saying and you have no idea how to answer. You know a few words of Czech, but only disconnected words and can't form them into a sentence and no matter how hard you try, you'll never be able to learn how to speak Czech. That's how Morris feels. Though, it's been his whole life and with English, which, luckily, he can read and write.


	3. A Bag of Day-Old Papes (Jack and Spot)

Jack frowned in at Stripes’ back as he watched the long-legged newsie scamper away with his day-old papers. And Jack still had no more questions answered that he did before he’d tried to talk to him. While he had heard the kid speaking before - speaking based on the loose definition of the word - he hadn’t said a single word during their entire encounter and had only looked at them once. If Jack thought about it any longer, he may have said that Stripes simply didn’t want to be seen. The only consolation was that Stripes seemed fed. Not well-fed, but fed. So, either he still had family or made more money than Jack thought he did. His clothes, boots and dishevelled hair begged to differ. And the bruise on his right bicep in the exact shape of a handprint concerned Jack. He may have a home, but was it truly a good one?

Once he and Charlie had gotten his mess of papers packed up again, Jack had asked, “You wanna come with us to Jacobi’s? All the newsies go there at lunch.”

Instead of saying anything, Stripes simply shook his head no before pointing towards the docks and jogging off.

Aside from his lack of talking and quite possibly understanding as well, he just seemed skittish. Like a loud noise or someone crashing into his arm would set him off. Jack didn’t know what would happen if that happened. Would he break things? Yell, scream? Jack had no idea. He seemed like one of those kids who was just angry at the world.

“Tha’ kid’s odd,” Charlie muttered once he was out of earshot.

“Yeah,” Jack replied, looking in the direction that Stripes had gone until he could no longer see him.

“He’s hidin’ from somefin’,” Charlie added, “He aint wanna be seen.”

“Ya. Kids’ scared,” Jack mused, tearing his eyes away from the alley Stripes had turned into.

As much as Jack had followed Stripes the past week, he had yet to figure out where he went after climbing down from the crane after lunch. He knew that the kid spent his entire lunch break at the docks, but then promptly dropped off the face of the earth until the next morning when he could be seen wandering around attempting to sell his papers. Then the process would repeat. Stripes had wandered off before Jack could even offer to buy him twenty papers of the right day, so Jack knew he wouldn’t see him at the distribution gates the next morning and wouldn’t be able to catch him then either.

Maybe he’d at least try to find Stripes a new shirt. Because the black and grey striped one that he was wearing was absolutely threadbare and fit him awkwardly. It looked like he hadn’t gotten a new pair of clothes since he’d started seriously growing fast. Stripes was tall, that was undeniable, but it looked like he’d grown so fast his muscles had no time to catch up, making him awkward, like a puppy. A puppy with clothes that didn’t fit.

* * *

Spot was sitting on a retaining wall waiting for Race. Looking out over the water, Spot let the cool breeze blow through his hair. It was almost October, but the weather seemed to be changing sooner than usual. He bet they were going to have a longer winter than usual this year. Everyone said that Charlie could predict the weather like a professional, and he was never wrong, but Spot was pretty good at it himself.

Then he saw Morris Delancey and almost fell off the wall. It wasn’t that Morris had ever been particularly mean or rude to Spot in the past, they’d very rarely encountered each other, but it was just the reputation that he was slightly worried about. He’d heard stories about the Delancey brothers from Race. How they picked on Charlie, how they never had a nice word for them. Well, it was mostly Oscar, according to Race. Supposedly, Morris just stood up on the railing of the distribution office and watched. Never said much to anyone, and, honestly, during the strike, Spot hadn’t heard the younger of the brothers say a word to anyone. Just a lot of scowling.

Spot knew he was supposed to be waiting for Race, but he was extremely tempted to follow Morris, just out of curiosity sakes. He wanted to know what Morris did with his day when he wasn’t selling at the window. But Spot stayed put. As interested as he was, Race was more interesting to him.

* * *

Walking up to the distribution gate, Jack was still puzzling in silence. Charlie hung by his side, which Jack was grateful for. He knew Charlie was unwilling to go too far away from Jack after the strike, and honestly, he liked it. He couldn’t lose Charlie again. He just couldn’t.

“Youse thinkin’ too loud,” Charlie muttered as they stepped through the gates and headed towards Weisel and his nephews.

As usual, Weisel and Oscar were sorting the papers into piles of fifty - easier for everyone to count - and Morris was standing up on the second level at the railing, just watching. Occasionally, he’d say something, sometimes he wouldn’t, but today, he was just staring out towards the water.

“Papes for the newsies!” Weisel shouted once he and Oscar were done making piles, “Line up and get your papes!”

Making their way over to collect their evening papers, Jack watched Oscar and Weisel carefully. They still seemed a little wary of the newsies after the strike, which worked in all their favours. As long as the newsies didn’t pick on them, they were left alone and were never short-changed.

As Jack watched Oscar hand Romeo his papers, Jack heard a metallic tapping noise. Looking around, he couldn’t find the source of the noise, which was annoying and a little peculiar. It was like a clock that got supercharged, but louder and more annoying.

“Morris, would you quit doing that!” Weisel shouted suddenly, banging against one of the posts of the distribution office with his metal-tipped cane. The bang was loud and metallic and caused all the newsies in the yard to stop talking. The tapping stopped as well. Looking up towards the younger Delancey brother, he saw that Morris had his eyes closed and had covered his ears with his hands.

Jack huffed out a breath of air and looked around the yard. Slowly, the newsies were recovering from Weisel’s outburst but Oscar looked concerned. Jack had seen Oscar concerned before but in different contexts. Like, during the strike, he looked worried. This was a different kind of worry. Actual compassionate worry towards his brother, who was currently trying to shut the entire world out up at his railing. Jack watched in fascination. Who would have guessed that the Delancey brothers actually had real human feelings?


	4. Three Loud Bangs (Morris)

The newsies were being very loud. They always were, but this particular afternoon, they were considerably more riled up than usual. Yelling, screaming, shouting and just running around while wrestling and hanging off each other. Morris couldn’t understand why they were so worked up.

Climbing up to the raised platform above the distribution office, Morris tugged his hat down low over his eyes and looked out towards the docks. He didn’t want to be here right now where he was forced to sit and endure the torture of noise that the newsies were ambushing him with and pretend that it didn’t bother him. If he made any indications that it bothered him, the newsies would figure out it was him and his cover would be blown. But no, he had to help Uncle Weisel sell papers to the newsies.

He didn’t even understand why he had to be here helping anymore. Uncle Weisel didn’t even let him help out nowadays. He used his voice one too many times and was now instructed to stay put on the balcony and keep a lookout in case the newsies were making any trouble. They rarely did, and even if he saw something starting to go wrong, Uncle Weisel had told him not to speak around others, so alerting anyone was out of the picture.

His ears were ringing with the commotion of noises and the only thing to replace the horrible sounds he was hearing was to make a steady noise of his own. So he started tapping the toe of his boot against one of the railings. The noise, while barely able to be heard above the commotion of sounds below him, was just enough to focus on and distract from his frustration.

Then, he saw Jack and Crutchie at the front of the line, saw Jack look up at him, and Morris’ blood ran cold. Tugging the brim of his hat down again, Morris fixed Jack with his best ‘Delancey glare.’ He swallowed his fear of being found out and looked Jack straight in the eyes. It felt awkward but Morris pushed through it because he knew that the action of prolonged eye contact was something he would never do on the streets.

Jack and Crutchie got their papers and headed a little way back towards the main gates of The World. Morris let out a sigh of relief and adjusted the brim of his hat. The talking was starting to get to him and Morris felt like his head was going to explode like a fish that had been sitting out in the sun for too long. So he tapped his foot harder. Not only did the tapping give him something to focus on, but the repeating vibrations up the lower part of his leg were distracting as well.

_BANG BANG BANG_

Morris knew that the noise came from Uncle Weisel’s metal-tipped cane. Whenever he wanted Morris’ attention he hit that stupid cane against whatever he could find as hard as he could. He must have known that the noise hurt Morris’ head worse than any of the others. It felt like that one time that Uncle Weisel had smacked him on the back with the fire poker after using it to adjust the coals over the flame. He couldn’t remember what he had done to deserve getting a hot rod of metal smacked across his back, but he remembered the painful feeling until this day. Cane against metal made his head feel the same way.

He didn’t know what Uncle Weisel had yelled up at him then, but it didn’t matter. It wouldn’t have made sense anyway. Morris clapped his hands over his ears and tried to stop the noise from bouncing around. He wondered if Oscar had backed him up. He wondered if Oscar explained to Uncle Weisel why he was tapping his foot.

Actually, no. He hoped that Oscar had said nothing. Oscar hid a lot from Morris and he knew it. He didn’t know what he didn’t know, but he knew that Oscar likely hid more bruises and burns under his shirts than Morris had ever had to. He knew, as children, when they first came to live with Uncle Weisel, that Morris took the brunt of his anger. Then, slowly, Uncle Weisel started leaving him alone. That was when Morris noticed that Oscar would wear his shirts without the sleeves rolled up, he would try to hide a limp or slouch.

The newsies collected all their papers quickly enough and started to file out of the yard for evening selling hours. Morris kept an eye on them as they left the yard, especially Crutchie and Jack. He wondered what the other guys said about the two of them sometimes. Maybe it was because Morris was very observant or just wanted to see what he wanted to see, but he wondered if there was more to their friendship than solely just friends. Of course, he’d say nothing, because that would put them in jeopardy, but he wondered sometimes.

He wanted to know if there were other people who felt the same way as he did. He watched as Crutchie and Jack walked through the gates, bumping shoulders and laughing. Morris sighed to himself. He wasn’t alone. Not completely at least. Morris knew that he was different on a more fundamental level than not being able to speak or talk. He was a sixteen-year-old boy that liked other boys. Putting it that way was a lot simpler than saying that he was a sodomite. Just like that coaler from the newspaper a couple weeks ago.

Morris had never said it out loud, but he wondered, if and when he left Uncle Weisel if he could find something like what Jack and Crutchie had. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just so y'all know, there is no upload schedule for this AT ALL. I'm literally just going to post whenever I manage to get a chapter finished between schoolwork and work work.


	5. We's Goin' Sleuthin' (Jack, Romeo, Specs and Jojo)

Jack hadn’t seen Stripes at the distribution office that evening - which, he figured would make sense - since the tall newsie sold day old papers. Still. Jack had hoped that maybe just maybe he would have decided to come and get a decent batch of papers.

He wondered just how much Stripes had understood from their earlier encounter. It was obvious that, while he knew words, he had no idea what order to put them in. He seemed extremely intelligent and had the same spark behind his eyes that both of the Jacobs boys did.

Jack looked back towards the distribution office again. If he squinted, Morris looked an awful lot like Stripes. Maybe he was only seeing that because that was what he wanted to see. The long lanky legs and hat pulled low over his eyes. Sure, his hair was pulled back a little and Morris was more muscular than Stripes, but still, the resemblance was striking.

He huffed to himself as he and Charlie made their way towards Grand Central Station for evening selling. Where could Stripes have gotten his day-old papers from? There were very few places where unsold papers were supposed to be thrown out. The bins behind The World was one such place. Anything put in there was hauled to the packing plants down by the docks. The only other place that Jack knew of was in the cans surrounding the lodging house. He had never seen Stripes anywhere near the lodging house before.

As the two of them approached Grand Central, Jack turned to Charlie and asked, “‘ow would youse feel ‘bout a stake-out tonigh’?”

“A stake-out? Jack, youse crazy,” Charlie replied.

“No I’m not,” Jack countered before adding, “I fink I know where Stripes gets ‘is papes from.” 

* * *

Romeo was surprised when Jack approached him on his walk back to the lodging house. It wasn’t that Jack never talked to him or ignored him, but usually, by the end of the day, they were all so exhausted that an exchange of friendly shoulder or fist bumps was the extent of communication. Today was no different. Romeo was worn out, but Jack seemed to want his help with something.

“Romeo, ‘ow do youse feel ‘bout a little sleuthin’ tonight?” Jack asked. To Romeo, it seemed like he’d already managed to get Specs and Jojo on board with the idea, as they were hanging close to Jack, eagerly awaiting his response. Crutchie was nowhere to be seen, but that wasn’t unusual. Jack’s right hand man often returned to the lodging house early at night, when he was simply too tired to keep himself upright any longer.

“Sleuthin’?” Romeo questioned. Who did Jack want to follow? What crazy hunch - which were usually unnervingly accurate - did he want to track down this time?

“Yeah,” Jojo cut in, “Youse know tha’ tall newsie in the stripes that we never see?”

Romeo nodded in confirmation that he knew who they were talking about.

“We wanna sees where he gots ‘is papes from,” Jojo finished. Romeo tried to not roll his eyes at Jojo’s excitement. Why was Jack so hell-bent on figuring out who this guy was?

“Fine,” Romeo replied, “I’ll come.”

* * *

Specs thought that there was something odd about sneaking around back behind The World at an hour so late that they all should have been in bed already. Though, he couldn’t deny the fact that this excursion with Jack was exciting.

“So, wha’ we’s lookin’ for?” Romeo whispered into the night.

“Lookin’ to see if anyones goes into the bins,” Jack said, readjusting his sitting position on the retaining wall. The four of them were perched on the concrete wall, wrapped in their winter coats to ward off the cold off the ocean, just across the street from the bins at The World.

“Youse finks this is where tha’ kid gets ‘is papes?” Jojo whispered.

“They’se gots ‘em day old but in good condition,” Jack explained, “where else in this city can youse gets papes like tha’?”

Specs snorted to himself. He was mind blown at Jack’s powers of deduction. His ability to connect dots. Sure, Jack claimed that he wasn’t that smart, but really, none of them were. Specs only had a second grade education, and most of the guys had less than that. Jack had none, had never gone to school, and yet, here he was, illustrating for The World and the co-president of the Newsboys Union of Lower Manhattan.

* * *

Jojo had been laying on his back and looking at the stars when he heard a horrible scraping noise. Sitting upright faster than he ate his breakfast, Jojo let his eyes refocus on where the rest of the sleuthing crew were already looking.

From around the side of the distribution office, a body rushed into view. The person, cloaked in shadows, looked around, as if trying to determine if the horrible noise had drawn any attention to himself. Eventually, he seemed content that he wasn’t noticed and made his way towards the bins. Jojo huffed in amusement as the four of them silently watched the dark figure slowly open the bin and reach over the edge, torso deep into piles of unsold papers.

That was when he watched Jack hop off the ledge and slowly make his way towards the figure. He could tell that Romeo and Specs wanted to follow, but Jojo waved them down. Jack needed to handle this alone.

* * *

Just as Jack expected, Stripes had showed up to collect some papers for the next day. He didn’t have a pack with him nor his cap, but just in the way he moved, it was undeniable that it was him. Nervousness seemed to eek out of every fractured corner of his being as Jack silently walked towards the bins.

He wasn’t entirely sure what his plan was, but Jack soon found himself just meters away from Stripes, his presence still hidden by the cloak of darkness. Deciding to hide in the shadows a little longer, Jack pressed his back to a brick wall and waited. Stripes ran a hand through his lengthening hair before looking around one more time. That was when he reached into the bin and pulled out an armful of papers. It didn’t appear that he was planning on counting them, but to Jack, it looked like he’d managed to snag anywhere between twenty or thirty in one go.

He knew the kid spooked easily, so Jack decided not to make his presence known - besides, what would he even say if he did want to try to talk with him? Watching as Stripes looked around - his grey eyes flicking across Jack’s still hidden body, he started walking back the way he came.

Then he tripped. Papers spilled out in almost every direction from the tall boy that had sprawled to the sidewalk awkwardly. Jack stayed put but watched as he slowly rose to his feet, observed his scraped elbow before taking off into the darkness. He was surprised just how fast Stripes could move. It made sense, his legs were long enough.

Once Jack was sure that Stripes was long gone, Jack extricated himself from the shadows and approached the mess of papers he’d left behind. He knew that no one was supposed to go rifling through the bins, so Jack quickly scooped them up into his arms.

CLINK

Looking down, Jack saw something about the size of his fist shining in the moonlight. Dull silver polished smooth with four holes in it, Jack recognized it instantly.

Morris Delancey's brass knuckles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to use Morris' skull breaker, but I have no idea what one of those looks like to describe it, so I decided on the brass knuckles instead. Also, I'm very excited to keep writing this, its getting so ominous as the two get closer and closer to finding out the truth :)


	6. Opening The Gates (Morris)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Going to put a tw at the beginning of this chapter...  
> Morris is not in a great place, mentally. Its not said outright, but Morris has/is considering what would happen if he no longer existed. Also, Weisel is an asshat and its basically said outright that he hit/punched Oscar. 
> 
> This is why the tags are getting updated to reflect the contents of this chapter, as well as bumping the rating from T to M.

Morris checked his pockets for what must have been the fourteenth time. His brass knuckles were gone, completely and utterly gone. The skull buster was where he knew he’d left it, but the brass knuckles were missing. Uncle Jeremy had given it to him for his birthday years ago. He was probably only four or five, but at that point, they all realized that he’d likely never speak or learn to speak. Protection was the key. The brass knuckles didn’t fit for years, but they did now.

They helped ground him too. Aside from tapping his foot against things, he would stick his hand in his pocket and lace his fingers into the holes. The heat of the metal would radiate up his arm and into his shoulder. It would help release the tension in his upper body and calm him down. Morris seemed to need to calm down more and more often recently.

He didn’t like playing the bad guy. Never had. Morris hated how he treated Crutchie during the strike, hated how he treated all the guys. But he had to play up his role as one half of the Delancey brother duo for his own safety. He needed Uncle Weisel’s protection. He needed to make him happy. Because a happy Weisel was a calm Weisel.

He wasn’t entirely sure when he realized that he could sell papers to earn some money of his own, but it was a couple months ago by now. Sure, he wasn’t good at it by any means, but the papers that he got were free, so he wasn’t losing any money in this little venture of his. The only thing was that he was drawing suspicion to himself. Uncle Weisel always wanted to know where he was going, according to Oscar translating for him. He always said he was going to the docks. Oscar never translated what Weisel would yell at him after that.

Morris was simply just trying to collect enough money to go off on his own and be free of Uncle Weisel. He wasn’t sure what, exactly his plan was. Maybe he would apply to work at the docks or at once of the packing plants. Maybe he would never get a job because no one would want to hire some kid who couldn’t even speak. But he was getting ahead of himself again, blood pumping in his ears, pulse racing. Reaching into his pocket to grip his brass knuckles, he remembered that they were missing. Still.

_Where could they have possibly gone? Did I drop them when I was out selling yesterday? No, because you had them at the distribution office in the evening. Are they under your bed? Tangled in your blankets? No, because you just checked there. Ripped your whole damn bed apart. Are you sure they aren’t in the pocket of your other pants? Yes, because you checked. Besides, these were the pants you were wearing yesterday. Did they fall out of your pocket when you tripped on the curb while trying to steal papers? Maybe. So go check by the bins before Weisel and Oscar need you at the office._

Morris raced down the stairs of the office and house that the Delancey’s called home and rushed out the front door. The sun had yet to rise above the horizon, tinting the sky a soft shade of orange and pick. He wished he could see the sunrise from the top of his uncle’s old crane. Maybe someday. Right now, he needed to go look out by the bins.

Rounding the corner, he spotted the metal trash can he’d managed to trip over in the dark last night and stood it up against the wall. Hopefully, everyone just assumed that a family of raccoons or rats had been digging through it last night. But there were no brass knuckles to be seen, nor any scattered pile of papers on the ground. It was clean. All of it was gone.

_Was it a dream? Did you fall asleep right after supper and dream the whole thing? No, you scraped your arm up. That's very real. You’re going to have to bandage that up and hide it under your shirt so the newsies don’t connect the dots. Goddammit, Morris, you have to be more careful._

Sighing in defeat, Morris dragged his feet back towards the office, slowly accepting the fact that his treasured brass knuckles were probably gone. Maybe he’d put his skull buster in his pocket and play with that instead. But it wasn’t as satisfying to hold nor did it mean anything to him other than what he’d beaten the newsies up with.

_You may not have known what you were saying when you yelled at Crutchie, but you made the choice to push him to the ground. You didn’t have to yell nor get physical, but you did. You didn’t have to grab him and let Snyder get his hands on him, but you did. You didn’t have to punch Jack and the other guys, but you did. You knew exactly what you were doing, regardless of what you said to them. You’re a waste of space. You’re just a burden. You’ll never be free of that._

Approaching the office, Morris saw that the grate had been opened already and Oscar and Weisel were already counting the papers into stacks of fifty. He was late. Weisel yelled something at him, but Morris just let the noise hade away in his head. He wasn’t up for starting a fight.

“Go open the gates,” Oscar said, using their own made-up hand signs, throwing the keys at him, “I’ll stay here and count the papers.”

“You sure?” Morris replied, noticing a blooming bruise on the side of Oscar’s head, not quite hidden by his hair and his hat. Weisel had hit him again. Likely this morning. Likely because he hadn’t kept an eye on his dumbass brother and let him wander off.

_Your idiocracy is causing Oscar to get hurt. None of this is his fault. If it wasn’t for me, Oscar would be so much better off. They don’t need me. Neither of them do. The world would be better off if I just...disappeared._

“Yeah, I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about me Morris,” Oscar replied, counting out another set of fifty papers into an even stack.

“Okay,” Morris said slowly, though not convinced. He didn’t want to leave Oscar alone with Weisel, but really, what choice did he have?

BANG BANG BANG

Uncle Weisel smacked his metal-tipped cane against the metal desk of the office, causing both of the boys to twirl their heads around to stare at him. Morris refrained from clapping his hands over his ears as his spine felt like it turned into goo inside of him. Weisel yelled something while pointing at the still-locked gate. He wasn’t dumb, he knew that Weisel needed him to go unlock it and was getting mad at him for taking his sweet time talking to his brother.

_Keep your head down, keep your hat low. Roll down your sleeves, they can’t see your scraped up arm. Don’t fidget, don’t speak. Ignore them. Make eye contact when needed. Fake a punch if they don’t back away from the gate. Unlock the lock without fumbling the keys, don’t let the chain get stuck. Morris Delancey is not scared of anyone. Morris Delancey doesn’t regret his actions. Morris Delancey doesn’t consider falling off the top of the crane._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is there a little DEH reference in there? Yes. Yes, there is. No, I am not sorry.


	7. Stripes Does That Too (Jack, Davey and Race)

“Davey!” Jack shouted the next morning as the lodging house filled with the clamour of young boys trying to get ready for their day. The bathroom was packed, the sinks, even more so. And in the chaos, Jack couldn’t find his second in command. Well, one of his seconds in command. Davey seconded his union work, Race seconded his newsboy's leadership and Charlie seconded his fatherly nature around the lodging house. Right now, he needed someone who could write but could also keep a secret.

“Davey!” Jack called again, tearing through the lodging house. He ignored the confused looks on the faces of the other guys as he searched for the allusive black-haired boy. Les was at the sink, so he knew that Davey hadn’t yet left for the distribution office, but he had still vanished into thin air.

“What is it Jack?” Davey asked calmly, appearing behind him suddenly. Jack nearly jumped out of his skin but whirled around to face the older of the two Jacobs boys. He was partially dressed already, though it looked like he’d managed to get to a skink and shave before the other guys had.

“I need youse to 'elp me write somefing,” Jack replied, toning down the volume of his voice significantly. He hadn’t shown Jojo, Specs or Romeo what he’d picked up after Stripes had dropped his papers last night. Because it could be a coincidence. Right? Maybe a kid living on the streets had found it prudent to need a set of brass knuckles. Which was a decent theory until he had looked at them closer after getting back to the bunkhouse and noticed that there was a set of carved initials in them.

M.D.

Morris Delancey.

Or, it could be anything else. Maybe Jack was seeing what he wanted to see.

“Okay,” Davey said sarcastically, rolling his eyes hard enough that Jack was surprised they didn’t pop out of his head. He knew that he should just keep his findings to himself. There must be a reason that Morris Delancey was selling papers on the streets. There was a reason for everything. But that didn’t make what he did to them any better. It excused very little. Jack wanted answers, he wanted an explanation. And goddammit he hoped that Morris knew how to read because if it was the same kid, he obviously couldn’t communicate using his words.

Sitting down on Davey’s bottom bunk next to the taller boy, Jack watched him pull out his notepad and inkwell before asking, “what do you want to say?”

* * *

Davey was dumbfounded. How was it that Morris Delancy, the thug that tried to haul his little brother off to the Refuge, was selling papers? Was a newsie? They were supposed to be a band of brothers, that was what Jack had said that first night after a long day of selling. They looked after each other. He was fairly certain that there was something that Jack wasn’t telling him, or else Davey would have called him crazy.

First of all, how had Jack managed to track him down in the first place? It wasn’t a secret that the Delancey brothers lived with their crazy uncle above the office, but it was still a miracle of miracles that Jack had caught him stealing day-old-papers. And managed to get his brass knuckles. Davey saw that guy wearing those damn things all the time. If it wasn’t the brass knuckles, it was the skull buster, wrapped tight around the same hand. They were almost synonymous with Morris himself.

And, Morris wasn’t that smart? Sure he was good at playing the tough guy, but his voice was odd like it was forced the entire time. Like he couldn’t hear himself speaking the words. It was awkward and unless he was yelling, he stumbled through most of his sentences. If he couldn’t speak, Davey had no idea what possessed Jack to think that Morris could read.

Aside from sending Charlie to the Refuge and almost sending Les there. Aside from punching him square in the jaw and yelling any number of insults at him. Aside from being a Delancey brother, Morris just didn’t seem like the most stable person on the planet. Sure Weisel was a little unhinged, so a little crazy probably rubbed off on him that way, but Morris seemed like he was one incident away from snapping. Davey hoped he wasn’t around to witness that.

* * *

They walked down to the distribution office that morning together, Charlie practically hanging off Jack’s arm. The weather was changing, Charlie announced that morning as the nuns passed out their food, and Jack noticed that his leg was awfully seized. It barely bent at all and he was walking awkwardly on it.

Jack wished there was some way to ease his pain a little. Spot had mentioned something in passing, yet Jack had yet to be able to actually find it. Something called ginger. Apparently, it worked when Spot got cramps. Jack didn’t know why Spot would get cramps, but honestly, at this point, he was willing to give it a try for Charlie’s sake. Maybe after his next paycheck from The World, he would go down to Chinatown and actually go looking for the allusive “ginger root.”

Approaching the gates of the distribution office, Jack noticed they were still locked. Sure, the clocks had yet to chime six bells, but usually, Oscar and Morris had the gates unlocked at at least five-to. Today, it looked like they were out of luck.

Though he could see the boys in mention at the office window, Oscar and Weisel counting papers while Morris just stood there looking rather unkempt, arguing with each other. Well, Oscar and Weisel were arguing. Morris was just digging through his pockets and tapping his foot against the pavement.

 _Stripes does that too,_ Jack’s brain reminded him. Reminded him that he wasn’t imagining things.

But what was fascinating to Jack was how Morris and Oscar were talking and yet not talking. They were using their hands. Maybe that was how Morris ‘spoke.’ That would make sense, all things considered, for him and his brother to have created a way to communicate.

Reaching his hand into his own pocket, he felt the edges of the paper, ripped from Davey’s notebook and the hot metal of Morris Delancey’s brass knuckles.

* * *

Race lit his cigar and watched Jack fiddle with whatever was in his pocket. He’d been doing it all morning and was making Race very curious. He had no idea what Jack had in his pocket, but it was making him nervous and twitchy. Almost as twitchy as the tall newsie in the striped shirt that sold by the docks. Because damn, that kid never stood still.

He was starting to get curious about him. Maybe a little of Spot’s curiosity rubbed off on him or maybe it was just the lingering knowledge that as one of Jack’s seconds in command, he didn’t know someone. Didn’t even know the kid’s name or selling patterns. He was a nobody, as far as Race knew.

Huffing out some air, Race briefly considered approaching Jack right then and there to ask him about the kid. The idea was quickly stomped out as the literal stomping of Morris Delancey approached the gate. His hands were shaking, his shirt was untucked at the back of his pants and one of his suspenders was tangled in the other. He looked like horse shit. Really, he did. Usually, Morris was put together, his hair brushed and tucked back under his hat, shirt neatly pressed and tucked into his pants, one hand in his pocket, the other twirling the keys or the skull buster. This morning, he looked like a walking train wreck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Davey says that Morris isn't that smart. He is smart, but it's a common misconception for people with language processing disorders to also not be very smart. 
> 
> 2) Morris is having a hard time without the brass knuckles since they ground him. That's why he is so dishevelled. 
> 
> Are y'all liking this so far? I'm really enjoying writing it!


	8. The Newsie From Water St. (Morris)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tw for suicidal thoughts on the part of Morris (happens after the page "break"). I blame depression, using musicals as coping strategies, and school on this chapter.

At the front of the hoard was Jack and Crutchie, as per usual, flanked by the kid with the glasses, and the red-haired one with the backwards cap. He wondered, not for the first time, what their names were. That was one thing that he and Oscar had yet to figure out, was how to add names into their hand communication thing. Sure, whenever Oscar said Morris’s name, he put his hands together and made them look like a bird, and Morris would cross his fingers for Oscar’s name, but that didn’t mean they had a sign for all the newsies.

He knew they were saying things, shouting and yelling, probably trying to talk to him or goad him into snapping at them. Which on any other day he would have done. He would have faked a punch in their direction combined with a well-timed glare. But today, Morris pulled his hat low over his eyes and focused solely on getting the key into the lock with shaking hands. He didn’t let the tauntingly muffled sounds get to him. He refused to let them get to him. He wasn’t going to yell at or touch any of them again.

They were just so loud. They were always so loud. But he couldn’t bring himself to start tapping his foot in distraction. Morris felt naked without the weight of brass in his pocket, even though he was currently wearing many more clothes than he did when he was selling the papers. Which he wouldn’t even get to do this morning after he fucked up so royally at the bins last night. Why hadn’t he just picked up the dropped papers instead of panicking and running off?

He finally managed to shove the key into the lock, the space barely bigger than the key itself. The jitters made this feat hard on a regular basis, which was why Oscar usually did it, leaving Morris to fiddle with his skull buster or his belt.

The lock finally fell free and Morris untangled the chain, letting the flood of newsies enter the yard. Usually, Jack ran ahead, making sure he was as close to first as he could get to pick up his papers, maybe goad Uncle Weisel a little, but not today. Today he lingered and helped Morris hold open the second gate, which was usually Morris’s job. _Why is he being nice to you? You beat him up during the strike, brought him down to the cellar and locked him in. Why the sudden change of heart? What does he know? What does he want? He must realize how stupid you are, that you’re never going to be able to talk to him. Ever._

Once the rest of the newsies were all through the gate, Morris watched the famous Jack Kelly still not move. Suddenly, they locked eyes. Morris tried his absolute hardest not to look away because Morris Delancey was scary and intimidating. No matter how much it made his blood curdle, he didn’t look down. Instead, Morris fixed him with his best angry glare.

Jack said something to him to which Morris did not reply. He had no frame of reference to what the conversation was and couldn’t even pick a phrase out of his head. Instead, Morris just kept looking at him, not adverting his eyes. Hopefully, Jack didn’t misinterpret his silence as an attack. Jack just shrugged and dug into his pocket. From which he pulled out a folded piece of paper and his brass knuckles. He held out both objects towards him. 

Morris took a stumbling step back, unsure of how to proceed. _How had Jack gotten his brass knuckles? Where had he found them? How had he found them? Had Jack seen him at the bins last night? No, because that would mean he was there as well. No one was allowed at the bins after evening sales ended. Maybe he found them this morning. How did he know they were his? Aside from the tiny M.D. on the inside, they were average. You had to look for his initials. Maybe Jack did look._

Jack said one last thing while thrusting his hand forwards towards Morris. He grabbed the brass knuckles and the folded paper from Jack as roughly as he could, not wanting him to think he’d gotten soft. Immediately, he felt bad. But he needed to save face in front of Weisel and Oscar. Heaven forbid one of them thought that he was being too friendly with the newsies. Before he could let the guilt show on his face, Morris turned, shoving what he’d been given into his pocket alongside the keys before stalking towards the office.

He needed to think. He needed to get high above the city. He couldn’t be here right now. Running up the stairs of the office, he made his way right past Oscar and Uncle Weisel, ignoring their yells, likely aimed at him. Tearing through the house, Morris found his newsie bag and shoved his only other pair of clothes into it followed by his cap and his only book. Then he left and didn’t look back.

* * *

It was quiet at the top of the crane. It wasn’t in operation yet, so Morris had quickly scrambled his way up to the top. Usually, he stopped at the operator’s booth, but today, he went higher. He kept climbing until the sun shone on his face and the birds swooped above his head in lazy circles.

_Jump. Just jump. No one will notice._

_Shut up shut up shut up._

_You could though. Into the Hudson, onto the docks below. No one would notice. No one at all. You’d make the headlines once, maybe twice, then you’d be gone. You’d fade away._

_Not yet. Not right now._

_Weisel is going to hit Oscar again, you know that. If you didn’t exist to mess things up, Oscar would be fine. He wouldn’t have to stand up for you again. Never again._

Reaching into his pocket, Morris pulled out his brass knuckles and slid them into place. The heat of the metal was grounding and he ran his thumb over the top. He was safe. He was protected. And Morris pointedly didn’t think about how Jack got them in the first place.

_The paper. You still haven’t read the paper. What does Jack want from you?_

He unfolded it and placed it in his lap, hand without the brass knuckles gripping the crane and the other holding the paper in place.

> _Morris, I hope you know how to read or else this will make no sense. You dropped your brass knuckles last night when you tripped near the bin. I wanted to give them back to you then, but you ran off. I know this probably sounds really strange and unnerving, but if you are the boy in the striped shirt down on Water St., come to Jacobi’s Deli down on Liberty at lunch today. If not, just ignore this and have a good day._
> 
> _-Jack Kelly_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Also, I have no idea where the "real" Jacobi's Deli would be. If anyone knows, don't hesitate to let me know. As well, the comment about Morris selling on Water St. was literally just from a quick Google Maps search of Lower Manhattan where it looked like there were piers near the Brooklyn Bridge.


	9. Bruises and Scraped Away Skin (Charlie, Elmer, Jack and Specs)

“Oi, Crutchie, whys Jack talkin’ wif Morris?” he heard Race ask from behind him in the line. Closing his eyes in frustration, Charlie tried to bite his tongue. He couldn’t understand what Jack had been doing recently.

Between his recent fascination with finding out all about the newsie in the striped shirt, to sneaking around at all hours of the night last night, to whatever he was doing talking with Morris Delancey, Jack had been acting plain odd. Charlie didn’t know what made him more upset, the fact that Jack wasn’t telling what was going on or the fact that he was talking with one of the Delancey brothers. It wasn’t even necessarily that he was talking with Morris that was making him mad, it was that Morris had been picking on him specifically for as long as he had been selling papers for The World. His taunts were never very creative nor inspired and closely resembled the ones that Weisel had for him, but it was the pushing and shoving that he really hated. Bruises and scraped away skin was what he got for his troubles.

“I dunno Race,” Charlie replied, shrugging his left shoulder, “gots no idea wha’ he’s doin’.”

“Hmph,” was Race’s only reply, puffing out another plume of smoke.

Charlie swatted it away with a frown and turned to look at the back of Romeo’s head. He didn’t want to think about Jack or Morris anymore.

* * *

Elmer took his fifty papers and was halfway through stuffing them into his bag when Morris Delancey sprinted past him and up the stairs of the distribution office. He was not quiet about his movements and every step he took on the metal sounded like the pounding of Weisel’s cane.

“Morris Delancey, get your incompetent ass back here,” Weisel shouted after his nephew.

Elmer was surprised that Weisel knew a word as long as ‘incompetent.’ He certainly knew enough other rough and mean words. Then, he saw Oscar flinch, closed his eyes and pinch the bridge of his nose.

All three of the Delancey’s had been behaving strangely this morning and he just could not figure out why. It was like the careful balance that had been struck after the strike was disintegrating. Elmer briefly considered going over and comforting the remaining brother. The one left behind with his crazy uncle.

Looking back over his shoulder towards where Morris had come running from Elmer saw Jack stalking closer, face pulled into a frown, hands shoved deep into his pockets. He knew better than to approach Jack when he could literally see smoke puffing out of his ears, but that did not change the fact that he wanted to know what was wrong. 

* * *

Charlie was in a funk and Jack couldn’t figure out why. Jack knew that his leg was acting up worse than usual this morning, but that was never enough to make him be this out of sorts. Sure, he could just ask, but that made Charlie more mad, usually. He knew that Charlie did not like to be treated like a child, but sometimes, when he neglected to share how he felt, Jack started worrying about him. Which was extremely hypocritical of him to say, when he rarely ever shared how he felt.

He walked slowly beside Charlie out towards Grand Central and chanced a look towards the cranes at the docks, wondering if Stripes - Morris - had gone down that way after running out of the yard. There was something about Morris that made Jack just want to protect him. The same feeling he’d had back when he’d first saw Charlie leaning against the brick wall, body slowly being attacked by polio. Between the way he saw Morris and Oscar interacting and the way that they both seemed so terrified by Weisel. Jack knew he had to help out. Stripes - Morris - didn’t seem like a bad kid. Had just been dealt a bad deck of cards.

Jack knew he had to tell Charlie about Morris. What he’d seen the night before. That he’d invited him to Jacobi’s. He had no idea if Morris would even show up, though one could hope.

* * *

Specs folded the last couple of papers he had yet to sell and shoved them back into his back. His stomach grumbled. The remnants of hard biscuit and coffee had long since left his stomach and had been replaced by a long drink of water from a public fountain just after the station bell chimed ten times. He couldn’t wait to head to Jacobi’s and get his hands on the cold leftovers Jacobi gave them.

Heading in that direction along the pier path, Specs took off his glasses and untucked his shirt to clean them. Holding them between his eyes and the glare of one of the cranes, he saw a couple of smudges and brought them down to his shirt. Then suddenly he was crashing into someone, stumbling down onto the sidewalk. Curling his arm in towards himself to protect his precious glasses, Specs landed right on top of whoever he’d walked into.

“What are you doing?” the person who he had crashed into squawked out. Getting his wits about him, Specs maneuvered himself off the victim of his clumsiness and pushed his glasses back onto his face.

Suddenly, Morris Delancey came into stark focus, his brown hair matted down from where it had been pressed under his bowler hat all morning. When Specs extended his arm out to Morris to help him out, he saw something that made his voice catch in his throat. The scraped skin on his arms. In the exact same places that they'd watched Stripes scrape his arms the night before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is definitely a little shorter than usual, but school is really taking a toll on me and it took about a week to get this much done. Figured y'all deserved an update regardless of how short it was :).


	10. Can You Hear? (Morris)

Climbing down the crane, making sure to focus solely on the act of climbing and none of the other thoughts threatening to surface, the hustle and bustle of the city below started to filter into his head. It was almost lunchtime and the note from Jack sat folded in his pocket. Morris had yet to decide what he was going to do about it.

It wasn’t solely the fact that they all knew him as Morris Delancey that terrified him. It was the fact that, no matter how hard he tried, he would never be able to tell any of them his side of the story. That he didn’t want to be a thug anymore, never had. That he didn’t know what he was yelling at them when he yelled, that he shoved because he had to and not because he wanted to. He was a prisoner in his own body and Oscar was the only one that seemed to be able to comprehend that that was how he felt.

So, as much as he wanted to go to “Jacobi’s Deli,” he couldn’t. He would be surrounded by people who hated his guts. And, there was the nagging doubt in the back of his mind that that was exactly why Jack had wanted him to meet him there. So they could yell at him and beat him up for being an interloper. He had no idea what they wanted with him. The fear outweighed the desire to try to make friends and by the time his feet hit the pavement at the base of the crane, he’d made up his mind. He was going to just go home.

Turning and walking in the direction of the distribution office, Morris shoved his hands deep into his pockets, the right hand curling its fingers into the brass knuckles, the left grabbing onto the fabric of his pants. Looking down at his feet, watching the black boots getting placed one in front of the other, he followed one line of cobblestones, hoping that it would lead him straight and not into oncoming traffic. He couldn’t stand to try to look at anyone. He didn’t want anyone to recognize him. He was only sixteen, and yet, enough people thought that he was a proper adult. It worked in his favour, having grown so fast in such a short period of time that he was able to blend in. Fewer people asked questions that way. The fewer questions he had to answer with either nodding his head or just physical violence, the better.

Morris knew he had to change, but when people didn’t realize that, while he could hear, he couldn’t make out anything other than just noise, he got so angry so quickly that it was easier to shove and push than it was to try to stumble through an answer. Morris wanted to change. That was why he started trying to sell day-old papers. He needed to change, but to do that, he needed to leave Weisel. But, to leave Weisel, he needed money and selling papers seemed like the only thing he could actually do. And now that was slipping through his fingers too. He was never going to be able to change at this rate. Nothing was ever going to change.

Then he was falling to the hard pavement for the second time in less than a day. Well, falling seemed to be the wrong word as someone fell on top of him, knocking the wind out of him. His lungs felt like they were malfunctioning, making it impossible to pull any air back into them. Having been punched in the gut more times than he wished to remember, Morris remembered that he had to stop panicking and try to just force himself to let air into his lungs as slow as possible. It would work, he just had to be patient.

The person that had fallen onto him quickly scrambled to his feet and Morris squinted against the bright noon sun above their heads. He could just barely make out a newsie cap on top of the stranger's head. Maybe they weren’t such strangers though. They were solidly in Lower Manhattan, so he probably knew whoever this was. He had probably sold them papers just last night.

Offering out their hand to Morris, his brain clued in just in time that the newsie was offering to help him to his feet. Taking the offered hand, the newsie pulled and Morris found himself standing and dusting off his pants. Thankfully when he had fallen, Morris hadn’t hit his head and the only thing that was a little sore was his rear end, but he more or less expected that.

In the more even light of standing face-to-face with the newsie who’d knocked him over, he recognized him. It was the boy with the glasses as thick as bottle caps and curly blond hair. He was smiling, his mouth crooked up in the corner and his faded blue shirt was a little rumpled, likely from being crashed into by Morris. He really needed to start paying better attention when he was walking, regardless of how upset he was. It was simply lucky that he’d managed to crash into the one newsie that Morris was sure wouldn’t be able to hurt a fly.

He knew that newsie had said something to him, gesturing in the way he was going before they fell over. But Morris simply had no idea what he was telling him. With no frame of reference of their conversation, Morris didn’t dare open his mouth lest he say something that was rude or mean. So he said nothing and looked down at his feet.

The boy with the glasses frowned in Morris’ direction before placing a hand on his shoulder. Morris knew he jumped, not expecting the sudden contact from the slightly shorter boy, but tried to hide it by reaching up and pulling his bowler hat back into place over the top of his lengthening brown hair. Before he knew it, the newsie was picking something up off the ground and passing it to Morris, saying something again. He had been having things passed to him too much these past few hours and he was starting to hate it.

Looking down at the blond boy’s hand, he saw that he was holding his book. The one he’d stuffed into the newsie sack he’d stolen from the office when he’d started doing this. The only book he owned. He’d almost lost it. The blond newsie frowned slightly as Morris took the book. Trying to force a smile of gratitude, Morris subconsciously reached up, touched his chin with the tips of his fingers and brought them back down. His and Oscar’s motion for “thank you.”

The frown on the newsie’s face didn’t lessen, but he tapped Morris on the shoulder again. Looking up at the blond boy, he watched as he pointed at Morris before pointing at his ear. _Can you hear?_

Morris bet he was looking at the blond boy like he had grown a second set of eyeballs. No one had tried to wordlessly communicate with him before - aside from Oscar, of course. No one had ever considered asking him using simple motions before.

Nodding his head _yes_ , Morris mimicked drawing his mouth closed with his other hand, hoping that it would adequately explain to the newsie with the glasses what he wanted to say while they were standing in the middle of the street, having just knocked each other over.

The boy with glasses made another motion that almost looked like he was eating a sandwich before rubbing his hand over his stomach and then pointing at Morris. _Are you hungry?_

Morris couldn’t help himself. He hadn’t eaten since breakfast yesterday and his stomach had been protesting loudly for hours. Before he knew what he was doing, Morris found himself nodding his head _yes_ once again.

Waving towards himself, the boy with the glasses slowly started walking away backwards, still facing Morris. It was like he wanted him to follow. Morris didn’t even take a second to consider that he was likely going to Jacobi’s, like all the other newsies. He just blindly followed, the allure of food overriding common sense.

And then, somehow, he was walking into a deli, just behind the newsie with glasses. Morris wasn’t entirely sure how they’d gotten from standing on the street near the docks to pushing open a door to a crowded deli, but here they were. Before they pushed through the door, Morris could hear the noise. It was loud out here on the street, the cacophony of the newsies only having grown since the morning. They were still riled up by something. Swallowing down his fear and apprehension, Morris followed the newsie with glasses inside.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love Specs. I think he's such a sweet character (and a good dancer holy bananas) and really wanted him to be the first newsie to figure out how to talk with Morris. 
> 
> Also, please watch this non-Newsies-related video. Its got Ryan Steele (Specs) in it and I really like it. Its worth the 3:55 minutes of watch time.  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=byjBG2JRJh8&list=PLFxtUQRT3x4LL3sYqlhjwBSdPEyeSSsBo&index=12&t=0s


	11. He Can't Understand You (Henry, Charlie, Davey and Specs)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for discussions of likely an ED, plus vague mentions of some other abuse-related issues.
> 
> Stay safe y'all <3

Henry dragged himself towards the trays of food that Jacobi had laid out for them. He knew he had to eat up fast before they got kicked out to make room for the paying lunch crowd, but he just was not hungry. As much as Henry knew he had to force himself to eat, it just seemed so unappealing. Though, he knew that Jack had seen him not take a hard biscuit from the nuns at breakfast and Jack had eyes everywhere. If he had nothing now, Jack would make sure he did before they left.

Eating simply frustrated Henry. Nothing ever tasted good and then, after missing multiple meals in a row, he would find himself too nauseous to even consider trying to eat something until Jack tried to force-feed him. Then the process would start again. It made him want to skip out on coming to Jacobi’s most days. He knew that there were a lot of the other guys that had issues too. He knew that Elmer shied away from fist bumps and shoulder bumps, Romeo didn’t like when people raised their voices, Jojo was extremely possessive of all his belongings and Albert never went near the docks for fear of the water.

They all had their issues, and Henry knew that. He knew that, if he wanted help, the guys would be there. But he didn’t want help. He was fine how he was.

* * *

Charlie wanted to punch the daylights out of Jack. Regardless of how much he liked Jack, he could be a real dumbass sometimes, thinking with his heart and not his head.

He had been annoyed at the older boy all morning, though he had been trying to not let it show. It wasn’t really Jack’s fault. Or was it? He had been the one to make this strange decision in the first place. He had hoped that he would be able to get over Jack’s strange decision by the time lunch rolled around and they all crowded into Jacobi’s for the leftover scraps from breakfast. Eating their fill before they got kicked out to make room for the paying lunch crowd, Charlie wanted to be able to spend time with Jack without feeling anger towards him.

Better than anyone, Charlie understood the fragility of life. Of human life. Of his own life. Even now, his life was plagued by reminders of polio and every step he took reminded him of just how close he had gotten to never being able to experience anything he had since. How close he had been to never getting to share evenings on the rooftop with Jack and not getting to eat all his meals with the best family he could have ever asked for.

It made him mad at himself to be mad at Jack. They simply did not have the time in their lives to be spent angry with each other. They could both get locked up tomorrow or they could live the rest of their lives together. Charlie nor Jack knew when their time together would end, so they had no time to be spent mad at each other.

But that didn’t make Charlie want to punch Jack any less.

The older boy was already sitting on a tabletop, digging into a waffle when Charlie dragged himself through the door of Jacobi’s. Looking around, Charlie saw Jojo and Ike goofing off in the corner, pushing and shoving each other, seemingly having forgotten the food on the tables. Davey was sitting near Jack, discussing something on a piece of paper in his hand. Race was nowhere to be seen, though Charlie would bet that he had already crossed over the Brooklyn Bridge. Les and Patch were sitting under a table with what looked like a bowl of pudding between them. The room was still relatively empty and yet the clamour of the guys who were already inside made it feel like there were many more newsies gathered than there actually was.

As he made his way towards Jack and Davey, Charlie heard the door to Jacobi’s open and he turned over his shoulder carefully to see who had come to join them.

And then he wanted to punch Jack even more. 

* * *

Davey really did not expect Morris to show up to Jacobi’s. He really didn’t think that any of the Delancey’s could even read. They struggled to count to any number other than to fifty, and so Davey had been underestimating the three thugs since day one. Counting to twenty shouldn’t have been as hard as it seemed to be for them. But as the taller of the two brothers walked through the heavy door of Jacobi’s, looking no less upset than he had that morning when he’d ran out of the distribution yard, Davey was surprised.

Morris looked scared and small, like he was seconds from turning around and running away. For a boy as tall as him, he looked smaller than Specs, who he had been following, looking like a lost little puppy. His face even looked like Les’s when he got himself freaked out.

Suddenly, as if just noticing their visitor, Jack hopped off the table and started heading towards Specs and Morris. As if compelled by some invisible force, Davey found himself following. He wasn’t going to let any fights break out. Not this morning. If that meant backing Jack up, he would follow.

It wasn’t a secret that the newsies harboured bad feelings towards the Delancey’s. He didn’t exactly like them either. But regardless of how little he liked Morris, Oscar and Weisel, he didn’t want to see any of them get beat up by a mob of angry newsies again. Especially not when Morris looked as scared as he did at this moment.

“Hiya Morris, glad you came!” Jack exclaimed, reaching his hand out for what Davey assumed was going to be a friendly handshake.

Morris just looked at Jack’s hand with one of the most confused looks on his face that Davey had ever seen.

“He can’t understand you Jack,” Specs quickly cut in. Davey had no idea how Specs had figured that one out, but he huffed to himself with the new knowledge. Maybe Morris Delancey’s almost crazed sounding rambling was a function of his lack of understanding. It would certainly explain some things.

Then, amazingly, he watched as Specs turned towards Morris, pointed at both of his out eyes before pointing at himself. Turning back towards Jack, and without taking his eyes off Morris, he shook Jack’s hand.

Understanding flashed behind Morris’s dull grey eyes, lighting them up for the first time, and he awkwardly stuck out his hand. Jack smiled and took Morris’s hand, shaking it firmly and causing the taller boy’s thin arm to flop around like a limp fish.

Davey was dumbfounded. He had seen Morris and Oscar interacting without talking before, but he’d never connected the dots on his own. Yet here he was, standing next to Specs, watching him seemingly holding mostly complete conversations with the boy in the glasses. 

* * *

Specs smiled at Morris and gave him a set of thumbs up after Jack dropped his hand. Sure, the handshake was awkward and Morris looked confused, but he was getting somewhere now. He was making progress.

Almost instantly, Morris looked back towards Specs and gave him a set of wide eyes, like he was trying to ask him a question. Specs, as smart as he sometimes thought he was, just couldn’t read the question in Morris’s eyes.

 _What is it?_ Specs tried to ask, making the “I don’t know” gesture with his hands.

Morris’s face contorted into a frown and he looked down at his feet as if he’d managed to stump himself and was starting to shut down again as he had done at the docks. That was when Specs heard a tapping sound. The same tapping noise from the distribution office that Weisel hated so much. Morris was starting to spiral into his head, Specs could see that behind his eyes again. There was nothing there. His gaze was completely blank.

Placing a hand on Morris’s shoulder, the younger boy jumped again but seemingly launched himself out of his head and back into the present.

Repeating the same action from before, Specs tried to ask _What is it?_ again.

Holding out a hand, Morris motioned with his other hand, as if he was writing on it, before copying Specs’ shrugging motion. _Do you have a pencil and paper_?

Specs watched Davey nod, before making the _follow me_ gesture.

Anxiously looking from Specs to Davey and back to Specs, his eyes wide again, Specs made a motion to _go follow_ and Morris did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Inspiration, mania, or both? An alternate title for this chapter. Not only is this the third chapter in four days, but most chapters are only two pages typed on Google Docs, this one is a whopping three pages. 
> 
> 2) I gotta say, as someone who communicates using primarily ASL, it is very difficult to not just describe the real signs for these sentences and trying to make up new ones. Additionally, when Oscar and Morris are talking, it is shown with "quotation marks around their words" because they are truly talking. The newsies form of talking with Morris is in /italics because it's not really talking and just trying to understand each other/.
> 
> 3) My headcanon is that Jacobi gives the newsies whatever food he can't sell at dinner the previous day or breakfast that day, as an early lunch. 
> 
> 4) As random as Henry's part at the beginning may be, it is going to factor in later. I promise its foreshadowing and not just me going bonkers.
> 
> 5) Once again, there is no upload schedule, its just kinda...whenever I get around to it. 
> 
> 6) Youtube tidbit of the day...Mike Faist as Jack Kelly doing Seize The Day. It will make your day...  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cclbMBLrq7Y&list=PLFxtUQRT3x4LNwb8fUpEMOnIgAbFGFlRj&index=25&t=0s
> 
> Thank you for reading!


	12. The Gold Tipped Cane (Oscar)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for "on-screen" verbal and physical abuse. This chapter is from Oscar's perspective and one of his physical interactions with Weisel happens after the page break. 
> 
> Stay safe everyone <3

Oscar tried to meet his little brother’s eyes as he sprinted away, up the stairs and into the small living space above the distribution office. He wondered, if he had managed to get Morris’s attention as he ran past, he would be able to have calmed him down and prevented the flying-shit storm of rage that Weisel was sure to unleash. Morris was special, there was no doubt about it. He was his precious little brother and, while he was no longer as little as he had once been, Morris still needed an extra set of eyes, looking after him. Weisel sure wasn’t going to do it, so it fell to Oscar. And, well, it was a little difficult to keep track of Morris nowadays, but he could always be found on top of the crane. Often, Oscar would look there first.

His brother was smart. Insanely smart. His book, the only one they had between the two of them, he had entirely memorized. Word for word, picture for picture. If it was a quiet day at the distribution offices, Morris would ask him to choose a number between one and twenty-three - the number of chapters in the book - and he would then proceed to tell Oscar the story of that chapter, not quite word for word, but very close. Oscar simply wished his brother could hear and speak properly. Because he knew that if Morris could do either of those, he could have a fighting chance at going to school. Instead, he was stuck here, doing nothing because Weisel did not trust him. Oscar knew he was nowhere near as smart as his brother - had messed up counting out twenty papers from his stack of fifty just before the strike, earning him three lashes around the bare of his back from a belt that evening. He was very good at counting to ten and five though. Or, counting to ten five times, specifically.

He stood up for Morris. Every time his brother would start incessantly tapping his foot and Weisel would yell, Oscar tried to explain that he couldn’t help doing it. He would yell at Weisel until he lost his voice to try to protect Morris. After Weisel had thrown Morris against the wall of their room hard enough that Oscar had heard the sickening crack of his little brother's arm when they were ten and twelve, he’d been getting in the way of the punches. He could take more than Morris could. He was bigger - in every dimension except up - and he was stronger.

So when he saw Morris running up the stairs, he braced for the inevitable. Beside him, he heard Weisel grumbling under his breath before shouting, “Morris Delancey, get your incompitent ass back here.”

Oscar cringed. He hated that Weisel couldn’t see the intelligence behind Morris’s eyes. Had never even tried to learn how to use his hands to speak with his younger nephew. It worked for the two of them, why couldn’t it work for Weisel. Simple. He didn’t try. He just resorted to violence. As if violence would fix Morris’s ears or make him talk properly. The only thing it accomplished was teaching Morris bad phrases that he could repeat towards unsuspecting strangers. _You want some of that too, you lousy crip?_ One of Weisel’s favourites to yell at Morris, if he ever looked startled when Weisel would hit Oscar. Morris was nothing if not an excellent mimic.

“What, youse not gonna stand up for that crip brother of yours?” Weisel sneered at Oscar. Keeping his head down and finishing counting out another stack of fifty papers, he tried his hardest to ignore his uncle.

“Always gots somefin’ to say,” Weisel continued, “always gots some defence for that dumbass. What, nuffin’ today?”

Oscar really wanted to praise himself at that moment for not losing his mind and staying calm on the outside. On the inside, he was reeling. How could Weisel say something like that about a blood relative? Regardless of the fact that he had been saying things like that about the two of them the entire time they’d lived with him. He was just glad that Morris would never know exactly what Weisel was saying about him. Oscar knew it would crush Morris. That was why he never translated Weisel’s insults.

“Finally given up on him too,” Weisel said with what sounded like triumph.

“No I ‘ave not,” Oscar muttered back, too scared to raise his voice any louder than that.

“Maybe one day that skinny rat will jus’ fall off that damn crane,” Weisel said as he handed a stack of papers to the small newsie with the eye patch, effectively nicknamed - what else - Patch.

“How could you say that ‘bout your own nephew?” Oscar said, turning and running up the stairs, hoping to catch Morris and leaving Weisel alone in the office.

* * *

Oscar was folding the blanket on Morris’s bed when he felt the metal tip of Weisel’s cane crack him square in the back. Sending him sprawling forwards, Oscar tripped over Morris’s mattress and braced for an impact with the outside wall that never came. Instead, Weisel had reached out and grabbed the tightly buttoned collar of Oscar’s shirt, stopping his forward movement and choking him at the same time. He could feel the threadbare material rip with the force, knowing that this shirt could never be repaired and he’d need a new one.

Then he was stumbling backwards, his shirt ripping further with the speed in which Weisel had pulled him in the opposite direction. Landing on his rear-end on the hardwood floor, Oscar felt his left wrist twinge in pain but he made no indication that it hurt.

“You left the office,” Weisel shouted and in the light shining from the window, Oscar could see spit flying from his mouth. The gold coloured tip of the cane glinted in the midday sun as Weisel pointed it towards Oscar’s face. His uncle wound his arm back and the last thing Oscar saw before it connected with the side of his head was the creepy smile that Weisel always wore whenever he did things like this to either of them.

Then everything went black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy belated Valentines Day? Not exactly a Valentine's story, but I wasn't able to get anything done for yesterday (wrote a midterm yesterday and then did some Valentines-related-things).
> 
> I know that even chapters are usually for Morris, but I decided to give Oscar a turn for this chapter. Perhaps even chapters are going to be a little more like Delancey chapters if y'all like the idea of giving Oscar a turn to talk. 
> 
> This one is a little shorter than usual, but I did it all tonight so I could actually get something done.
> 
> And, as is starting to become routine (and because I love sharing with y'all), here is your daily Youtube tidbit...  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QsScBGt2LE&t=72s  
> (skip to 5:15 for some good old fashioned young Mike Faist)


	13. Jus' Play Nice (Davey, Jojo, Buttons and Jack)

Davey was impressed with how well the rest of the guys were behaving around Morris. If he was being entirely honest, he was surprised someone hadn’t jumped him yet. The only person who was visibly distraught was Charlie. Picking at the fabric on the part of his crutch that was usually tucked under his arm, Charlie seemed intent to ignore the younger of the two Delancey brothers who was following Davey around Jacobi’s.

“Imma go finds Morris some paper,” Davey said, turning to Jack and Specs, “Youse gotta go talk wif Charlie.”

With that, he shoved Jack in the direction of the blond boy in danger of destroying his crutch in anger. Sometimes, his two best friends could be absolute bone-heads, not understanding when it's time that they need to have a real conversation.

Walking away towards the kitchen, Davey looked behind him to see if Morris was still following like a lost little puppy. Sure enough, a couple of steps behind, there was Morris, looking incredibly terrified. Davey just shook his head at himself, wondering what could have happened to get Morris looking like this. Other than the fact that he was currently incredibly outnumbered in a closed-in space with people who likely wanted to hurt him.

“Mr. Jacobi?” Davey called out as he walked through one of the doors. Seeing the older man at the counter, rolling out what looked like a batch of dough into flour on the counter, Davey suddenly wondered if he was even allowed back in this area.

“Yeah kid?” Mr. Jacobi said, turning around to face Davey, his hands thoroughly coated in flour.

“I was wondering if youse had any paper and graphite somewhere that we could borrow?” Davey asked, turning around to see where Morris was at. The tall skinny kid was lingering in the doorway, not coming into the kitchen but not running away either. Davey wondered where all that Delancey bravado went.

“Wha’? Youse all goin’ ‘bout schemin’ anotha strike or somefing?” Mr. Jacobi asked, but Davey could hear the joking tone in his voice as the man wiped his hands off on his apron and began digging through the pockets of the service apron underneath.

Pulling out a mostly used up pad of paper and a short stub of graphite, Mr. Jacobi held it out to Davey and said, “‘ere, jus’ keep it. Mostly done anyways.”

* * *

Jojo couldn’t believe his eyes one little bit. He knew that the tall newsie they’d seen at the bins last night was Stripes, but now, in the daylight, out of the context of either the distribution office and the papers, it was undeniable the visual similarities between Stripes and Morris. It was like they were the same person.

No. They were the same person. And somehow, Morris had tricked them all into thinking he was a newsie. Was that how the Delancey’s knew everything about the strike? How they were always one step ahead of them the entire time? Was Morris a spy?

Something just did not seem right about that notion though. Yeah, he didn’t like the Delancey’s nor their deranged uncle any more than the next guy, but he just didn’t think that Morris was capable of something like that. And besides, why go through the trouble of struggling to sell day-old-papers without being caught by Weisel if he was just a spy? You didn’t just sell papers for the sake of it. It was hard and did not pay well. There had to be another reason.

Jojo remembered back when he first came to live in the lodging house. Around the same time, either just before or just after, Elmer had joined them. Having run away from a bad home, Jojo learned later. To this day, he hated when anyone touched him in any way, playful, joking or otherwise. It was that same skittishness that Jojo thought he saw again in Morris. Maybe that was why he sold papers. Something to do with Weisel at home, perhaps.

* * *

Buttons would later deny that he did not start the yelling and shouting match that erupted from the stunned silence the second Davey and Morris walked through the door towards the kitchen but it seemed like shouting, “wha’ the hell is Morris Delancey doin’ ‘ere?” was simply just saying what everyone else was thinking out loud. What he did not expect was the sudden cacophony of twenty-some-odd voices suddenly all shouting over top of each other. It was hard to pick out a single voice from the noises, but Buttons wondered if he’d managed to singlehandedly start a riot.

“ENOUGH,” Buttons heard Jack’s voice shout over top of all the noise, effectively silencing everyone again.

Suddenly, all eyes were on Jack, expecting an explanation of some kind. Buttons could not believe it. After all they had gone through with the strike. After all the things the Delancey’s had done to them over the years. Here Jack was, trying to befriend one of them.

“Wha’s goin’ on Jack?” Albert asked, his hat cocked sideways on his head, arms folded over his chest.

“Morris been sellin’ papes, aint he boss?” Jojo jumped in, “He’s that kid in the stripes, aint he?”

“Yah, he is,” Jack replied, pulling his hat off his head and running his hand through his hair before tugging his well-worn cap back on, “Look guys, youse all sellin’ for a reason, yah?”

Buttons was impressed as he looked around and saw the vast majority of the guys in the room either nodding or humming in affirmative. It took effort not to agree. If his parents hadn’t died of cholera a couple of years back, Buttons bet he would at least still be living at home.

“There aint no reason why a kid like Morris, wif a family, would be sellin’ papes unless there is somefing else goin’ on,” Jack said, “Yah, he’s done bad fings to us, but there’s somefing else goin’ on and I needs to figure it out. Kids skinny as all hell, so I figures we’s gots to feed ‘im.”

“So we’s gots to be friends wif the Delancey’s now?” Henry asked and Buttons couldn’t get a read on his tone. He sounded outraged and confused at the same time. Buttons felt the same way.

“Not askin’ youse to be friends, I am askin’ youse to give ‘im a second chance,” Jack said, “the kid is scared, can’t talk, can't hear, and obviously aint eaten. I bet my suppa tha’ he’s plannin’ on runnin’ with his money from the papes. Jus’ play nice, is all I’m askin’.”

* * *

“Charlie,” Jack said, announcing his presence as he sat down on the curb next to his blond partner. After he’d calmed down the rest of the boys, he’d watched Charlie all but run out of Jacobi’s. Jack knew he wasn’t going to go far, refused to go too far after the strike. It worked in his favour, for the most part, nowadays.

“Oh...hiya Jack,” Charlie said, looking up from where he was scowling at his feet.

“Um...youse don’ looks so good,” Jack muttered, knowing this conversation was definitely going to be one of their awkward ones. Wrapping an arm over Charlie’s shoulders, and pulling him tight into his body, Jack felt a pounding heartbeat under the layers of shirts.

“I thinks youse doin the right fing wif Morris Jack,” Charlie whispered, “Its jus’...everytime I sees him...all I can finks of is the strike. Him ripping my banner off before gettin’ punched in the face and hauled to the Refuge. Its all I sees.”

“I know Charlie,” Jack said, pulling Charlie in closer, letting him tuck his face into Jack’s neck, “I know.”

“I know you knows, I jus’ don’ want this to go sideways cause youse messing with Weisel’s nephew. Or Oscar’s brother, for tha’ matta,” Charlie muttered, “Youse don’ know wha’s goin on wif those two. We don’ even really know wha’s goin on wif Morris.”

“We don’t, youse right,” Jack agreed, “But Davey’s gettin’ him some paper. We’s gonna learn his side of the story real soon, okay?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have not dropped off the face of the earth entirely, who knew?!
> 
> Dialogue, dialogue and more dialogue. I've found myself accidentally writing my other stories (on here and for school) with the Newsies slang I use and have to say to myself, "No MRT, you can't write like that anywhere other than here."
> 
> Youtube tidbit of the day...Broadway on broadway with the Newsies...  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-GU6tfmbrSk&list=PLFxtUQRT3x4LNwb8fUpEMOnIgAbFGFlRj&index=19&t=0s


	14. Where Art Thou Romeo (Morris and Oscar)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for the results of Oscar's interaction with Weisel

Morris quickly looked around the table area of Jacobi’s. He couldn’t see Specs or Jack anywhere - only dozens of sets of eyes staring at him. It wasn’t hard to get a read on people, he’d only been doing it his entire life. When you lived under Uncle Weisel’s roof but couldn’t understand what he was saying, Morris became an expert at reading people’s faces.

And these guys were not happy to see him.

Looking down at his feet with a scowl, Morris seriously considered leaving and never selling papers ever again. Which would mean he’d have to leave town. He wasn’t sure how far he was going to get with the dollar forty he had in his sack, but he’d be willing to try. Grand Central wasn’t far. He could probably be in Grand Forks by this time tomorrow.

No. He had to stick around. He had to try to right his wrongs. If he left now, he knew it would haunt him for the rest of his life. Looking up from his feet slightly, Morris looked at the paper and graphite in his hands. What to write? What to say? How could he erase years of tormenting and harassing the newsies with what he could write on a piece of paper? It was impossible.

From the sea of newsies, a small black-haired boy stepped forwards. He was wearing mostly beige, like most of the guys, but his clothes seemed too big, not too small. His murky green eyes were sparkling a little under his mustard coloured hat when he gently grabbed the graphite and paper from Morris. Swallowing hard, Morris wondered if the smaller newsie was going to rip his paper into shreds before punching or hitting him. Or perhaps he’d just yell at him.

He remembered this kid from the strike. Ended up getting smacked around quite significantly by the cops. Morris was certain he didn’t lay a hand on this kid, but he couldn’t remember for the life of him if Oscar or Uncle Weisel did.

Morris watched as the kid smiled at him, his eyes crinkling up in the corners and his lips pulling into a grin while he wrote something on Morris’s paper. Then, the kid with the black hair handed the sheet back to Morris. Accepting it gingerly, not wanting to snap his hand out and grab it, running the risk of ruining or smudging the letters, he brought his hand back towards his body.

Looking at the tiny handwriting on the paper, in the top left-hand corner, leaving space for more writing, he saw what he assumed was the kid’s name. _Romeo_.

Morris looked from the paper to the kid, before looking back at the paper and smiling. _Romeo_.

He liked how that sounded inside his head. In the back of his mind, he knew that the other newsies were watching him skeptically. But, he knew that they were the tightest band of brothers he had ever met and would never do anything to harm one of their own. As long as Romeo was talking with him, Morris was safe.

Pointing at the paper that Morris was holding, the kid - Romeo - said something. It had three chunks of sounds to the words. Snapping his head up from the paper, Romeo said it again, his free hand pointing to himself. Morris assumed that that was what “Romeo” sounded like. Maybe one of these days he would try and say it out loud. At least now the small black-haired boy had a name.

 _Romeo, Romeo, where art thou Romeo._ Morris wrote right beside the smaller newsie’s name. He thought he was being clever and handed the paper back to Romeo. Rewarded with a smile, Romeo took the paper and graphite, preparing to write something.

 _So you’ve been selling papers?_ Romeo wrote.

Morris only managed an ashamed nod. He knew he could take the paper back from Romeo and give him a real answer, but he couldn’t force himself to do it. He couldn’t force himself to admit to the fact that he had done horrible things to people who had never done anything wrong to him.

 _How long?_ Romeo asked.

Morris held out three of his fingers, hoping that it would adequately answer three months. Three months of selling papers, three months of trying to be a better person.

 _You wanna learn some of our names?_ Romeo wrote, cocking his head to the side a little, eyes displaying his question plainly. Morris shrugged but smiled. He didn’t particularly have to go interact with these guys, but, at this point, it wasn’t up to him. It was up to this kid who had decided he needed to meet the people he had spent years beating up on people. He followed Romeo anyways.

* * *

Oscar was in pain. Lots of pain. He really couldn’t remember the last time that he hurt this bad. His head was pounding, that was the first thing that he noticed. It felt like it was going to split in two, right there on his bed. Wait. How was he on his bed? That had never happened before. Well. Weisel had never knocked him out before either. An afternoon of firsts, it seemed.

One thing that Oscar knew for sure was that he had to leave before Weisel came to check on him. He had never seen Weisel that angry before. Ever. No matter what he and Morris had ever gotten into as younger children, Weisel had mostly contained himself. Or at least measured his blows. He had never hit Oscar that hard before.

Sitting up caused Oscar’s stomach to roll, turn and feel like he was going to violently lose the entire contents of his stomach everywhere. Frowning and looking around, Oscar couldn’t see his jacket. Well. He would just have to leave without it. He knew that it was a bad idea, leaving without an overcoat, but he really had no choice at this point. The sun was setting already, casting orange shadows on the buildings and shining through the open window of the room he and Morris shared. Used to share. Before Morris ran away.

Oh God. Morris.

Where had his little brother gone? He had no idea what Morris would do out on the streets alone, unable to communicate, scared and cold. Heck, he probably had no money with him either. And it wasn’t like New York was a small city. As much as Oscar hoped he had gone to the docks, there was no way of confirming it. He would never forgive himself if something happened to Morris.

Fighting through his pounding headache, churning stomach and fuzzy brain, Oscar stumbled to standing with the help of the wall beside his mattress. He had no idea how he was going to get to the streets below. Up on the second floor, it wasn’t like he could just jump from the window, yet, he couldn’t leave from the front door because he had no idea which part of the house Weisel would be in. That left the window.

Shaking his head at his terrible decision, Oscar began to climb down the drainpipe, pushing through the mixed signals his brain was sending he held on tight, focusing on the feeling of cold metal on his hands instead of the soft feeling threatening to overwhelm him. Oscar wasn’t sure how far from the ground he was when he fell, but he felt his foot twist at an awkward ankle when he hit the ground sending renewed shoots of pain up his leg. Sitting on the wet cobblestones, Oscar tried not to cry. He needed to be strong. He needed to find Morris. He couldn’t be sitting here on the ground, crying over a sore foot.

Struggling to his feet, Oscar ignored his foot and began a slow walk towards the docks. Hopefully, that was where Morris had gone. He made it maybe three blocks in that direction before the fuzzy feeling in his head took over again.

Leaning against a wall, he vaguely heard someone shout, “Kid youse okay?” before his legs gave out from under him and everything went black again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. I promise I have a plan with Oscar, I'm not just torturing him for the sake of it. Though, I have no plan with newsie found him. If there is a newsie I'm missing or that you love that hasn't gotten much screen time yet, send me a comment and I'll tally up the votes for who found him. 
> 
> 2\. In slightly different news, I had the opportunity to see Dear Evan Hansen live the other day, so I've definitely been focusing a lot more on my Dear Evan Hansen postings since the inspiration has been flowing on those ones, but I promise I have not forgotten this story. This one is my baby. 
> 
> 3\. And, the youtube tidbit for this chapter is of Andy Richardson (I can't tell if he is Romeo or Crutchie at this point), but he is at 2:04 if you don't wanna watch the whole thing  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rwf8QEZGP68&t=235s


	15. An Empty Bunk (Jack, Finch, Romeo, Charlie and Race)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TWs brief mention of old-fashioned homophobic language (in Race's section)

“Charlie, listen, can youse do me’s a favor?” Jack said into the quiet air of Jacobi’s. He knew Charlie was still angry with him over the whole...Morris fiasco. If he was in Charlie’s shoes, he knew he would be mad too. Jack just hoped he was making the right choice, doing this for the tall lanky kid.

When he’d come inside from sitting with Charlie on the curb, he’d smiled as he saw Romeo leading Morris around with his paper, introducing him to all the other guys. Jack had huffed to himself. He never once considered the fact that Morris likely had no idea what their names were. At least someone had the heart to try to interact with him.

Looking around, he saw Specs sitting with Henry, a plate with a cold waffle on it placed between them. Jack felt his heart swell with pride for his guys. This was his family. Heck he’d basically raised half the guys in this room alongside himself. Watching Romeo interacting with Morris, teaching him names. Specs making sure Henry ate. Elmer letting Patch sit on his shoulders. He smiled to himself. Yeah. He’d raised these guys good.

“No,” Charlie replied to Jack’s question, crossing his arms over his chest, looking Jack in the eye and pointed scowling at him.

“I’ll buy youse a caramel from Welches tomorra,” Jack said, not above resorting to bribery, “please?”

“Fine,” Charlie agreed, “What do yah need?”

“Can youse bring Morris back to the lodge wif youse tonight?” Jack asked cautiously. He would have asked Specs to do it, but Specs needed to sell papers tonight, it had been a slow morning. Jack knew that he’d be able to make up morning sales, Charlie’s missed sales and a bed for Morris with his headline-spinning. It wasn’t like he had never sold a false headline before. Besides, this was what he was good at.

“Make it two caramels,” Charlie replied.

* * *

Finch squinted against the horrible glare off the distribution office. While he was offhandedly expecting to see Morris standing up on his perch, he knew that Crutchie and Romeo had taken him back to the lodging to get him set for that night. Before they’d parted ways outside of Jacobi’s, Jack stared them down and made them promise not to breathe a word of Morris’s whereabouts to Weisel or Oscar. Romeo translated what Jack had said onto the paper for Morris and the younger Delancey brought his hand to his chest before bringing it back out, palm down, a motion that Finch was coming to think meant “thank you.”

Standing in line, Finch noticed that Weisel was flanked by two other guys, but neither were his nephews. Suddenly, Finch’s heart plummeted in his chest. Don’t get him wrong, he had no love for the Delancey’s in general but he also wished no harm to either of the brothers. From what he’d gathered over the years, the boys, due to shit luck, had ended up with their angry uncle against their will. Now they had Morris safe and under their wings and Oscar was missing. Out of the two, Finch thought that Oscar would have been the first to run out, given how many times he’d seen the blond brother trying to cover up obvious bruises and marks.

Looking around before subtly sneaking back in line to stand near Jack, Finch kept his face neutral and voice loud as he whispered, “Where’s Oscar?”

Without making a big show of it, Finch watched as Jack looked around the yard, scanning for the shorter brother.

“I dunno,” Jack grunted out, before adding, “keep an eye out on the streets for ‘im, yah?”

“Course,” Finch replied, asking, “Wan’ me ta pass it forwards?”

“Mmm,” Jack grunted in affirmation.

Finch swallowed the lump in his throat. He hoped that they hadn’t doomed Oscar in some way by taking his brother. You would have to be blind to see how the brothers interacted with each other. They were the most patient, loving, caring people among themselves. Then, somehow they were able to pull out these hardened shells and be ruthless thugs. Finch wondered if Morris would ever be able to lose that shell entirely one day or if it was simply a part of him now.

* * *

Romeo had no idea why he had offered to skip evening sales to walk with Crutchie and Morris back to the lodging house. Well, aside from the fact that his stomach did this insane flip-flop every single time he managed to get Morris to crack a smile. For all his failed flirtatious attempts with the girls on the streets, Romeo had never once felt this way about anyone. Ever. He didn’t even know what the feeling was. It almost made his stomach feel the same way as it had after the strike with spikes of white-hot butterflies shooting through it. But he didn’t know what the feeling was other than the fact that it was somehow tied to the strike and to Morris smiling.

Shoving his hands deep into his pockets, Romeo kept pace with Crutchie, making sure Morris understood that just because he had long legs, he couldn’t walk ahead of everyone. Then he’d get lost. The sun, while not quite yet set, was casting orange shadows off the buildings and making everything look like the inside of a fireplace. Shaking his head to clear his head from the image of a fireplace, licking wildly at wood, consuming a house, screams echoing off every corner….

Romeo felt a cold hand on his shoulder, shaking him from the memory. Twisting wildly towards the hand ready to attack, he saw that it was connected to Morris. Trying not to lash out and yell at the boy who wouldn’t be able to hear him anyway, Romeo watched as Morris moved his hand up and down as if he was trying to simulate the action of breathing in and out slowly.

Romeo frowned but decided to follow Morris’s hand anyway. In seconds he felt his heartbeat and breathing evening out, thoughts of a charcoal-stained childhood being replaced with awe at the younger Delancey brother.

Maybe he really wasn’t the monster everyone said he was

* * *

Charlie snorted at the display in front of him. Morris looked ridiculous, moving his hand up and down in the air, the other planted firmly on Romeo’s shoulder. Then he saw the shaking in the black-haired boy’s frame. He had been freaking out about something. And Morris had caught it.

Staring in wonder, Charlie watched as Morris managed to get Romeo’s shakes and breathing calmed down faster than even Specs could. It was unbelievable. Charlie really had no idea what he had just witnessed. Then, even stranger, Romeo put his hand to his chest before bringing it down again, palm ending pointed to the sky.

Morris copied the motion with a massive grin on his face before turning and making a _lets keep going_ , indication with his hand.

Charlie laughed and shook his head, causing Romeo to say, “wha’?”

“Nuffin’,” Charlie replied, waiting until Romeo turned back to look at Morris again before shaking his head. If Romeo didn’t quite understand yet, Charlie wouldn’t press the issue. It was safer for everyone if he didn’t figure out the feelings Charlie knew were bubbling up in his chest.

“So, where’s dere an open bunk?” Charlie asked as they rounded the last corner on their trek to the bunkhouse.

“Mmm, fink there’s one ‘bove Race, one below Albert and one below mine,” Romeo reported, obviously thinking hard through this question.

Charlie wasn’t stupid. He had a bum leg and arms but that didn’t mean he was blind. He would never give away the bunk above Race. It practically belonged to Spot now. Charlie bet any money that, given a loud enough slam of the lodging house door and a pointed shout up the stairs, they would give Spot and Race just enough time to right themselves before anyone made it through the door to the second floor. Charlie didn’t care what Race and Spot did on their free time, neither was obliged to come to Jacobi’s for lunch, and it would be incredibly hypocritical of Charlie to frown down on their activities given what he and Jack managed to get up to, but he just wished that they found somewhere else to do it other than in the bunkroom.

* * *

Race heard the heavy oak front door of the lodging house slam shut and that was what started the panic of pushing a very warm Spot off of him and frantically pulling all their clothes back onto themselves. Then, he heard a very cheerful voice shout, “Hiya Mother Martha!”

Crutchie. Of course. Announcing his presence. While Race was glad Crutchie had the decency to give them a heads up, he hadn’t expected any other newsies back to the lodge before sundown. Was something wrong? Had Crutchie hurt himself again? Was someone else hurt? Had Snyder been released from prison and was coming to get them all?

No. He was probably just tired. Totally valid to get tired. Especially when only working with one leg.

Pulling on their clothes in record time, Spot climbed up to the bunk above Race’s and dangled his head off of it, as if they were just hanging out like two not-sodomites. Just in time too, because Crutchie wandered into the bunkroom, followed by Romeo and...Morris Delancey.

What the fuck?

“He’s just stayin’ wif us for the time bein’,” Crutchie said. Did he say that out loud?

“Um...does Jack know ‘bout this?” Race asked, pulling himself to standing, attempting to look taller and tougher in front of Morris. But...was this even the same Morris Delancey? It couldn’t be. It had to be an identical twin of some kind. Like Mush and Sniper. A copy. Because, aside from appearance, this Morris Delancey looked like he was two seconds from either shitting himself, bolting, or both in that order. This Morris looked terrified. Spooked. Like nine-year-old Elmer had when he’d first stumbled through the doors of the lodge on Jack’s heels, a black eye just starting to bloom across his features.

“Yah,” Crutchie replied, “it was ‘is idea.”

“Oh,” Race huffed before asking, “where youse gonna bunk ‘im then?”

“Was gonna put 'im in the empty bunk under Romeo,” Crutchie said. If Race saw a blush spread across Romeo’s cheeks before the small black-haired boy turned to go find a blanket set, he wasn’t going to mention it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) whoo three pages instead of two!!!
> 
> 2) so I know that I teased Oscar getting found the last chapter, but I really wanted to bring Morris back to the lodging house first.
> 
> 3) voting is still open, however I think I've figured out which newsie (which two newsies, actually) will find Oscar. Like I said the last chapter if there is a newsie I have missed along the way that you would like to be featured and/or get a little segment, just shoot me a comment and I'll see what I can do.
> 
> 4) as for youtube today, I couldn't find anything directly related to any of these characters, but I'm not discontinuing youtube tidbits, I promise!


	16. Stop Talkin' 'Bout Me (Morris)

Morris looked down at the blankets that Romeo had handed him. Were they seriously offering him a bed to stay in that evening? They had fed him and now were offering to put a roof over his head, even after all the horrible things he had done to them during the strike. One of these days he would have to own up to his mistakes. Years' worth of mistakes.

Shaking his head to clear that idea, Morris looked between the blankets in his hands and the wood-framed bunk where the boy with the curly blond hair with the cigar between his teeth had pointed. He had never really seen a lodging house before. Never from the inside, at least. He was really not sure what he was expecting but it was not rows upon rows of wooden frame bunks with a mattress on top, squashed together as if to make the most room as possible for as many young boys as possible.

Having lived with Weisel for almost as long as he could remember, sharing a tiny little room with Oscar would be nothing compared to this. The big open space was only broken up by what looked like a washroom block in the corner and the entrance to the stairs right next to it. If Morris had to take a guess, there were probably twenty sets of bunk beds around the room. Which made sense, considering they sold papers to close to forty Lower Manhattan newsies every day.

Awkwardly sitting down on the bed that Crutchie had pointed to, Morris looked down at the folded blankets in his hands, badly wanting to wrap them around his shoulders to try to force the chill from his bones. He wondered if shorter people got as cold as easily as he did. Instead of doing anything or moving in any way, Morris simply sat still and tried to process the events of the day. He supposed that he had now officially evicted himself from the distribution office dwelling.

He wondered what Oscar was thinking. Did he think he’d run away and left him behind? They always talked about moving west one of these days. Was Oscar angry that he’d left without him? It wasn’t like Morris would be able to just waltz back into the distribution office and talk to him either.

From the corner of the room, Morris could hear the other four boys talking in hushed tones. They were talking about him. Even though he couldn’t understand a word they were saying, the way they were talking as if he could, gave him every indication he needed for confirmation.

“ _Stop talking about me_ ,” Morris grumbled. He was pretty sure that that was what he had said, had no reason to doubt the accuracy of his statement.

The boy in the red striped shirt and grey coat snapped his head around to look at Morris, his eyes narrowed in either confusion or anger. Romeo said something to the one in the red while the boy with the curly blond hair put a hand on his arm.

Perhaps Morris hadn’t exactly said what he meant. It was quite possible. He was only really good at repeating things he’d heard on a regular basis.

Moving over towards where Morris was sitting, Romeo made the ‘graphite on paper’ motion with his hands. Leaning back to retrieve the paper and graphite from his pocket, he handed it over to Romeo and waited for it to be passed back.

 _What did you say?_ Romeo asked, handing the paper back.

 _Stop talking about me, I know that that is what you are doing over there._ Morris handed it back with a glare at his feet, not able to hold forced eye contact for any longer. He had already messed everything up. He opened his big mouth and ruined his chances of making amends with these guys.

 _That is not what you said_ , Romeo wrote back.

 _That was what I meant. The words get all jumbled up in my head and I do not say what I’m thinking and I have no idea why._ Morris said, furiously blinking his eyes and trying to prevent the tightening feeling in his chest from translating itself into tears. The last thing he wanted to do was cry in front of these guys.

Feeling the bed dip beside him, Morris turned his head to the side just enough to see that Romeo had sat down next to him. _What do you mean?_ Romeo had written back on the paper.

 _I can hear that you are saying things, but I can not understand the words. I can think sentences, but anytime I try to open my mouth and talk, the words do not come out like how I was thinking them. I do not know why._ Morris explained, realizing for the first time that he had never actually tried to explain what was going on inside his head to anyone other than his family before. Maybe these guys actually cared enough to wonder why he never said anything right before.

 _So, you do not know what you are saying when you speak?_ Romeo asked.

 _Correct. I can only really copy words or sentences that I hear all the time._ Morris said, looking over to see Romeo’s reaction. When he saw Romeo’s features fall, Morris realized that the black-haired boy was starting to understand.

Romeo said nothing back, just handed him the read piece of paper before standing and walking over to where Crutchie and the other two were standing.

Frowning, Morris wondered if he had ever seen the boy in red before. Perhaps once or twice during the strike, but he was surely not a Lower Manhattan newsie. Heck, he might not even be a newsie, just a friend of the one with the curly blond hair. An exchange between the four boys followed, which Morris gathered was directly related to him and what he had not meant to say.

Sitting in self-imposed silence again, Morris wondered why he even bothered speaking anymore. It never got him anywhere and always caused more trouble than it was worth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) finally finished all my midterms and I get to choose next year's courses in a couple days. Yay! The end is in sight!
> 
> 2) I'm very sorry, this chapter is very chaotic. I wrote it on the train ride home from university last night at two in the morning. I promise I had a plan while writing this, I just kept getting distracted along the way and losing my train of thought. 
> 
> 3) I have not forgotten Oscar, I promise
> 
> 4) Newsies playing baseball? More likely than you'd think.  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3h_EW0Q35I&list=PLFxtUQRT3x4LNwb8fUpEMOnIgAbFGFlRj&index=38


	17. Five Minutes Older (Mush, Sniper, Specs, Elmer, Charlie)

Walking along the docks to drop off their unsold papers, Mush shoved into his brother’s side, causing him to stumble a little.

“Ya’ little twerp, I gotta throw youse in the ‘udson for tha’,” Sniper replied teasingly.

“I aint the little one,” Mush replied, “I’m older than youse by five minutes and youse knows it.”

“Cause youse aint neva lets me forgets it,” Sniper exclaimed.

Mush wondered how much truth there was in the five minutes fact. Before their sister died, she always claimed that it had been a five minute time difference, but Mush could do enough math to realize that Helen would have only been three when they were born. With mom dying when they were just days old, followed by Helen when he and Sniper were six, Mush wondered how much of that was real or if it had been made up to solve a dispute of some kind. Regardless, it had stuck.

They continued their walk to the collection bins in silence, just happily enjoying each other's company. That was one thing that Mush was grateful for. He had had his brother at his side every step of their lives. The boys at the lodge joked that they were one person in two bodies. Mush wondered if that was even possible. Even if it was, he was happy that Sniper had his own brain. He couldn’t imagine having to argue with him every single minute of the day. They did enough friendly banter during their waking hours as it was.

“Did youse ‘ear tha’?” Sniper whispered about two blocks later, papers unceremoniously dropped into their bins just minutes before.

“No,” Mush said, turning off his inner monologue in favour of listening to the sounds of the night around them. He heard nothing.

“Was comin’ from over ‘ere,” Mush said, turning down a dimly lit street. Shaking his head at his brothers’ blatant lack of regard for safety at night, Mush followed anyways. Sniper was the bold one. Mush, not so much. 

* * *

He could have sworn he heard coughing. Laboured, hagred coughing. Squinting down the dimly lit street Oscar thought he could make out a body, no bigger than either of them crumpled against a wall. Letting instinct take over, he walked towards the person, consequences be damned. When he heard steps behind him, he knew Mush was following him. Always protecting his six. Always.

“Kid, youse okay?” Sniper called into the dark. Getting no reply, he saw the body shift a little, moving from a barely standing position to what looked like how a baby sat. Approaching the body, he noticed the floppy blond hair first, partially covering his face. He couldn’t have been any older than him and Mush, but his clothes indicated at least a slightly better upbringing than they had had at the children’s home.

That was until Sniper saw blood leaking from a massive cut on the kid’s forehead. They needed to get him back to the lodge and now. Mother Martha could help him. They just had to get him back.

“‘elp me get ‘im up,” Sniper said, pulling on the kid’s now limp arm and hoisting him over his shoulder like how Jack sometimes did with Patch or Les. Supporting most of the kid’s weight - which there was a surprising lack of - Sniper began moving them towards the lodge.

* * *

Specs had wanted a peaceful evening. Perhaps make a cup of tea, sit in front of the fireplace, read a couple of lines of poetry from the book he’d found in the trash, get to bed early. The usual luxuries. He’d made it less than three steps from his bunk towards the door to head to the kitchen for tea when he heard the heavy oak door of the lodge swing open and bang against its frame.

“Mother Martha!” he heard someone - likely the door banger - scream before heavy steps took the stairs two at a time, banging open the door to the second floor.

“There’s a hurt kid,” Mush shouted, his face red, likely from running. With Sniper nowhere to be seen, Specs crossed his fingers and hoped that the hurt kid was not the younger of the two twins.

“He’s down the street, Sniper’s got ‘im,” Mush continued as Specs was already well into the process of shoving his feet into his boots along with Jack, Davey and Elmer. From his awkward perch under Romeo’s bunk, Morris was stuffing his feet into his boots as well, obviously ready to go help with whatever the cause was.

“Stay put,” Specs said to Morris sternly, knowing the kid couldn’t understand a word of it but not caring at the moment. Romeo could write it down for him. Specs took one last look at the rest of the guys massing nervously in the main clearing.

With Jack and Davey well down the stairs already, Specs took it upon himself to say into the sea of newsies, “Stay ‘ere. Listen ta Race and Spot. Don’t come downstairs til we’ve come up.”

* * *

There were few things that sent shivers up Elmer’s spine anymore. This was one of the remaining things though. Sniper had said kid in a fireman’s carry over his shoulder, so Elmer took the weight of the boy from him and used his remaining energy from the day to rush back to the lodge. Mother Martha was waiting for them just inside the door, leading Elmer through another door just to his left that he was fairly certain he’d never seen before. Not stopping to ponder that fact, Elmer slowly let the boy down onto a table covered in white cloth in the middle of the room.

Then his breath caught in his throat at who they’d just rescued. Beaten and bloody, bruised and burnt this was Oscar Delancey. It was undeniable and Elmer wondered if it had anything to do with Morris attending their lunch at Jacobi’s and sleeping in the bunkroom just one floor above them.

“Morris ‘as ta stay upstairs,” Elmer muttered to himself, loud enough for Davey to mutter an affirmative as he shoved past the two older boys and Specs. He took the stairs two at a time back to the bunk room, trying to find Morris before the lanky boy found his brother, just barely clinging to life.

“Where’s Morris?” Elmer whispered to the first person he saw just inside the door. It was Henry, a towel wrapped around his waist, rib cage far too prominent once again. He’d have to mention that to Specs or Jack again.

“Over wif Romeo ‘gain probably,” Henry said before turning back to the mirror to continue shaving.

Heading down the row that he knew Romeo’s bunk was in, he knocked into Crutchie with such force he almost sent him spiralling to the ground.

“Wha’s goin’ on?” Crutchie asked.

“Is Oscar,” Elmer whispered, looking around to see if he could spot the brown mop of hair belonging to the younger brother of said boy.

“Delancey?” Crutchie whispered back.

“Ya,” Elmer confirmed, “Now, where’s Morris?”

* * *

Charlie wanted to scream and punch Jack right in his carelessly smug face. One Delancey in the lodging house was where Charlie thought the line should have been explicitly drawn. Or, he thought the rule was no Delancey’s in the lodge. Now, they had double that amount. They were currently hosting Weisel’s two nephews in their lodge. Charlie loved Jack with every fibre of his being, but holy heck was this pushing his luck.

No, he didn’t deny the fact that Oscar was in terrible shape. It truly looked like he had been beaten within an inch of his life, and, likely by Weisel. It was likely their fault as well, for reaching out to Morris.

Oscar’s hair, which Charlie knew was blond, was plastered to his forehead with what looked like dried blood. Under his shirts, which Jack, Davey and Specs had managed to wrangle off of his beaten body before Charlie walked into Mother Martha’s study, Charlie saw a network of bruises and burns.

He knew that she was a healer at some point in her life, and had helped him on many occasions, but Charlie really wondered if she could even help Oscar at this point. The blond boy was barely breathing and it looked like every single breath he took could have quite possibly been his last. Charlie held his own breath watching the small, boney frame of the older Delancey barely move.

Broken from his study of Oscar by the sound of scuffling behind him, Charlie turned around just in time to see Morris scrambling down the stairs with Elmer hot on his heels. Skidding to a stop at the door to the study, Charlie watched as the younger boy's face fell and his legs gave out from under him, knees hitting the floor with a dull thud. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) after dropping that steaming pile of shit that we the last chapter on y'all, I got my act in gear and did another chapter which is, without doubt, better than the last one.
> 
> 2) I know I said I'm using the OBC newsies as my reference point for their appearances, however, I really wanted to use the twin newsies (Mush and Sniper) for Morris and Oscar to be able to relate to in terms of brothers and siblings.


	18. Let Yourself Feel (Morris)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tws:  
> \- aftermath of abuse  
> \- rage fit/attack  
> \- suicidal thoughts (stop at the italics portion if you don't want to read)

Morris knew something was up when he heard the guy with the checkered cap say his name to Crutchie, followed by Crutchie leaving the bunkroom and heading down the stairs. Well, Morris assumed it was his name that had been said - or some other jumble of sounds that were similar to his name. Regardless, after the commotion of newsies running out of the bunkroom followed by Specs pushing him back onto the bunk he had been sitting on, Morris was already on high alert. Deciding he needed to see what was going on for himself since no one seemed to be in the mood to tell him about it, Morris stood and started making his way towards the stairs.

He knew he was taller than most people and while he had little muscle to put behind his size, it was hard to stop him from moving when he got started. The newsie with the checkered hat called his name as Morris threw open the door to the stairs. Grabbing onto his arm, the same newsie - Morris couldn’t remember his name - tried to slow him down and Morris just shrugged him off. He took off down the stairs, gaining speed until he careened into the wall at the bottom, unable to stop in his socked feet.

From his position, Morris could see directly across the entry hall into what looked like a study of sorts. Books lined the walls and a bright light - brighter than any light Morris had ever seen before with the exception of the sun - hanging from the roof. The people inside the room had all turned to look at him, Crutchie, Jack, Davey, Specs and the twins, their faces as white as the sheets that were covering the table their bodies were mostly obscuring. Like they had seen a ghost.

Looking through the space between Davey and Jack’s torso’s, Morris caught a glimpse of un-kept blond hair and high cheekbones. Even with their eyes closed, Morris knew the side profile of his brother’s face like the back of his hand. Morris felt his breathing catch in his chest. Like he couldn’t pull in another breath if his life depended on it. In the sliver of Oscar’s body that he could see, blood was staining his hair, a black eye was starting to blossom and an imprint Weisel’s cane colouring his cheek.

Morris knew exactly what had happened. Well, not exactly what happened, because Morris couldn’t possibly look inside his brother’s memories and he knew that Oscar would likely never tell him. But that imprint. It was, without a doubt, Weisel’s doing thought.

He could hear someone speaking beside him and that was when Morris realized that he was now kneeling on the hard floor, the pain in his knees slowly spreading up his legs.

Oh.

He’d fallen.

Bracing a hand on his knee, Morris struggled back to standing, a choked off sob threatening to make itself known. He had to stay strong for Oscar for once. His brother had been strong for the two of them their whole lives, now it was Morris’s turn.

Two sets of arms grabbed onto his and started to gently tug him backwards, away from his brother and that was when Morris finally snapped. Shaking hard, the two guys - Jack and Davey - let go and Morris glared at them. He was not leaving Oscar. These two guys, who he barely knew, couldn’t make him. They just couldn’t.

 _“Let go of me!”_ Morris tried to yell, though he was certain that it didn’t come out how it was intended, solely judging based on the looks on the faces of everyone around him.

 _“You can’t make me leave him,”_ Morris continued yelling, his nerves and brain buzzing with red-hot fury and anger. Spending all day not lashing out, followed by the absolute barrage of new information and new scenarios, he needed to hit something and he needed to hit something now.

Screaming unintelligently, Morris spun on his heel and punched the heavy oak door to the study area that they were all standing in. The satisfying crunch his hand made as it connected with the wood cleared away the red-hot static and replaced it with the clarity of pain.

“I’m sorry Oscar,” Morris said wordlessly, his hands moving with practiced ease. 

Then, he turned and ran out of the room, tears threatening to pour down his cheeks. Turning right in the hallway, Morris pulled open the door to the street and stumbled out onto it. Standing in the cold night air, he cradled his throbbing hand to his chest while he shoved the other into the pocket of his pants and threaded his fingers into his brass knuckles. He didn't want to feel anything because he knew if he opened that box, he didn't know if he'd be able to close it again. Morris blinked through the tears now falling down his cheeks, shivering in the cold night air.

_Open it. Let yourself feel._

_You did this to Oscar. You left him alone with Uncle Weisel. Would you even really consider Weisel your uncle anymore? After he did this to Oscar? You don’t even know if he’s going to live or not. Is he going to live? He better._

_You’re just a worthless excuse for a brother. If you didn’t exist, none of this would be happening right now. For all you know, dad wouldn’t have left you with Weisel in the first place. Everything would be different._

_You can change that right now._

_Walk down to the docks._

_Climb the crane._

_No one will notice._

_Disappear._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) I am extremely ill currently and it takes an immense amount of energy to get anything accomplished, so updates may be coming a little slower until I start recovering a little. 
> 
> 2) I realized while writing this that Morris's brass knuckles "disappeared" in the past few chapters...so they made another appearance. I swear I didn't forget about them...hehehe
> 
> 3) youtube clip of the day... it's not quite Newsies related, but it's really awesome anyways. Mike Faist is playing Riff in Westside Story 2020. I won't say when he shows up in the video...just see if you can pick out the dude that is almost a head taller than everyone else around him.  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufbzDR8Yv9w


	19. Was His Uncle (Specs, Davey, Romeo, Race)

After Morris’s outburst, which Specs had to admit was a little startling, he watched the tall brown-haired boy rub his closed fist in a circle over his heart followed by making his hands do a little flapping motion. Then he all but ran out the door. Looking between Jack, Davey, Crutchie and the twins, Specs started following Morris out of the room. He was a few seconds behind the tall boy and watched the front door to the lodging house just bang shut as he ended up in the hallway. Assuming it was Morris who had run out into the street, Specs pushed himself through the door and into the cold night air. Shivering in his tank top, Specs crossed his arms over his chest and watched as his breaths of air swirled up above his head. Looking around the dimly lit street, he saw the frame of Morris’s body curled up into the brick wall. Crouched into a ball, shaking like the browning leaves on the trees in central park.

“Morris?” Specs called into the silence of the night. He knew that the younger Delancey couldn’t understand him, but he seemed to be able to recognize the sound of his own name. Morris grunted as he looked up from his human-ball that he was contorted into. From feet away, Specs could see the fire burning behind his eyes. Like he wanted to hit something. Again. Bust up his knuckles even better than he already had.

“Morris, breathe buddy,” Specs said, reaching out and gently touching his shoulder. The boy looked like he was about two seconds from running down the street in just his skivvies. Which was about all he was wearing at the moment.

“Ungrateful newsie,” Morris grumbled and Specs closed his eyes. He knew that Morris only knew how to copy words. He knew that. But the words bit into his skin anyways. Because it sounded just like Weisel. The tone, the growl, the lilt, all of it was Weisel through and through.

“You don’t mean that Morris,” Specs muttered, knowing for certain that that was too many words for Morris to know but hoping his tone of voice conveyed calm and concern. He just wanted to prevent Morris from lashing out again. Potentially hurting himself even more than he had already.

“C’mon, let's get you inside,” Specs said, reaching out his hand towards Morris, hoping it conveyed that he wanted to help him to his feet. Morris looked between the hand and his own hand and back a couple of times, like he couldn’t quite determine the nature of this hand in his face.

* * *

Davey frowned as Mother Martha shooed all the other boys out of her study except for him and Jack. Mush, Sniper, Elmer and Crutchie all slowly walked out of the room, looking over their shoulders back at the older Delancey brother nervously. Like they were looking at him for the last time. Davey swallowed and hoped that wasn’t going to be true. As much as he hated the Delancey’s, he couldn’t imagine how Les would feel if it was him laying on that table, beaten within an inch of his life.

“I need your help with this,” she explained, digging through a box of tools underneath the white coloured table, “but I would rather not see anyone else punch my door. I trust you boys won’t do that.”

“No ma’am,” Jack replied, taking the pair of fabric shears that Mother Martha handed him without question. Davey wondered how many times Jack had helped Mother Martha in this way. How many other newsies had he brought back in bad condition? And not just after the strike. Before the strike. Back when the Delancey’s were still messing with them.

“Wonderful,” Mother Martha said, “Can you please work on getting his shirt off? I need to see how far down these bruises go.”

Jack grunted affirmatively as Davey got a handful of white cloths shoved in his direction. He took them and held onto them protectively, though without a clue as to what to do next.

“Can you soak one of those in alcohol and lay the rest out on the table?” Mother Martha asked as she stirred together some drops of coloured liquid into a small glass container. Davey frowned at the odour coming from her concoction but said nothing as he fulfilled her orders.

Drenching one of the cloths in the bowl of alcohol she had poured out, Davey winced as it stung some of the small cracks and knicks on his hands. Laying it out next to the others, he looked back at where Jack was working on cutting off Oscar’s shirt. The action exposed more bruises. Dark marks down his neck and under the fabric across his collarbones, disappearing underneath the remainder of his shirt.

“What happened to this poor boy?” Mother Martha asked.

Davey said nothing, assuming it was a rhetorical question and turned back to the white strips of fabric.

“Was his uncle,” Jack replied and Davey snapped his head up and turned around to look at the two over by the table. His uncle? Weisel. Of course.

* * *

“Romeo,” he heard Specs call from the door to the second floor. Snapping his head up, Romeo looked at the boy in question and saw him standing with Morris beside him, a hand on his shoulder. Like he was preventing Morris from running off again. It was probably a good idea too, given the way Morris’s eyes kept darting around the room as if they were bouncing off every single newsie all at once. As if he was trying to catalogue every person in the room for a potential threat.

“Please, can youse keeps ‘im from runnin’?” Specs said, motioning towards Morris with a smile on his face. Like he knew that Morris couldn’t understand a word he said and was sugar-coating it. To prevent Morris from freaking out again. That was when Romeo heard the soft tapping noise he’d heard almost every day at the distribution offices. Morris’s foot against the ground.

“Yeah Specs,” Romeo said with a smile matching that of Specs’. He felt bad that he was deceiving Morris in that way, using his disability against him. Maybe it was a horrible thing to do. Maybe it was needed. Romeo wondered how Specs knew to do that. Romeo wondered if Specs cared that he was going behind Morris’s back.

Specs gently shoved Morris in Romeo’s direction before the boy in the glasses turned around and went back down the stairs. Romeo smiled as the tall lanky boy walked over towards the bunk they were sharing. Chin touching his chest, feet shuffling with every step he took, Morris finally made it to standing beside their beds.

“Wanna read something?” Romeo wrote on a sheet of paper that Davey had given him and passed it over to Morris. When he took it from him, Romeo crawled up onto his own bunk, guessing that he knew the answer already. He had seen Morris’s frayed and battered copy of Robin Hood and the Merry Men in his pack earlier and bet that a new book was in order. Not that he nor Davey had much to offer, but it was something to work off of.

* * *

Race scowled as Crutchie sat gingerly on the edge of his bunk. Watching as he leaned the well-worn crutch against the bed frame, Crutchie scratched the side of his head, above his ear, like he did whenever he wanted to talk.

“Wha’s on youse mind Crutchie?” Race said, looking down towards the stocky blond boy from the wood above his head where he had been analyzing the patterns in the crude paint job.

“What we’s doin’ wif the Delancey’s anyways?” Crutchie said. Race was about to answer when the younger boy continued, “Like, I know they’s aint in a good place wif Weisel, but why’s it us that theys come to?”

“Means they’s startin’ to trust us,” Race offered, pillowing his hands under his head to look at Crutchie properly.

“Guess tha’s good,” Crutchie said, raising a hand to his mouth to chew at the skin around his fingernails. Race used his socked toe to poke Crutchie’s arm to remind him not to do that. He didn’t need to catch anything nasty from putting his hands in his mouth. Snapping his hand down to his lap, Crutchie glared at Race.

“Wha’s this really ‘bout?” Race asked, pushing himself into a sitting position and leaning against the wooden frame of the bed to look at him properly.

“Wha’ if I was ‘avin’...troubles...wif a girl,” Crutchie asked and Race tried not to snort. He wondered if Jack had told him about the drunken conversation they had had a couple of weeks ago. The one where they basically admitted their affinity for other men to each other.

“Mhmm,” Race said, trying to prompt Crutchie into continuing. If they wanted to play hypotheticals, Race could play hypotheticals all day.

“Would...youse be able ta give me some...advice?” Crutchie asked, his voice stumbling over the words a little bit.

“Can try,” Race replied.

“Wha’ if this girl...keeps makin’ real big decisions...without askin’ me...or anyone i’s gonna ‘urt first?” Crutchie managed to stumble out.

“Why don’ youse jus’ ask Jacqueline ‘bout it?” Race asked with a smile while watching as Crutchie turned his head to look at Race with such speed that he thought he was going to hurt his neck.

“How did youse know?” Crutchie hissed, his voice barely a whisper.

“Told me. Was drunk, ‘nd I asked,” Race explained with a grin before adding, “youse jus’ gotta talk ‘bout it. Tell ‘er wha’s goin on.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) well...I may have more writing time coming up soon...looks like school going to be closed for the foreseeable future. Maybe I'll be able to get some more chapters out for this and some of the other stuff I've got going. Stay safe everyone and wash your dang hands please pretty please. Don't know y'all outside of online (that I know of), but I love y'all and would hate for anything to happen to any of you.
> 
> 2) Race is referring to part 4 of this series (Give Us Our Rights) when he says that he and Jack went to go get drunk. And yes, Jacqueline = Jack, I thought I was being clever. 
> 
> 3) Barely related (very very very loosely related) but the youtube tidbit of the day is an animatic of a cut song from Dear Evan Hansen. I really like it and wanted to share it so...here you go!  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4-Q7OFMJKw&t=22s


	20. Time to Rest (Oscar and Morris)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tw for mentions of past abuse, mentions of unintentional self harm

Oscar winced against the throbbing pain in his skull. Aside from the powerful urge to void the contents of his stomach, Oscar felt a little better than earlier. But...when was earlier? It could have been minutes, hours or days ago for all he was able to tell.

“Good, you’re awake,” the soft voice of a woman said as Oscar attempted to crack his eyes open. All he could see was a blinding light and a white sheet hanging off a hook on the wall. Was he dead? Was he in heaven?

“Ma?” Oscar said, his voice cracking and gravelly from lack of use. In any other mindset, he would have laughed at himself for sounding like Morris. Now, he was simply confused.

If he was in heaven - which was his only logical explanation for what was going on - that would mean their mom would be there. Certainly, she would be the one to greet him at the gates to heaven, right? No. He'd never make it to heaven. He was seventeen and had already managed to doom himself. He supposed it was truly what he deserved for his actions. 

“Shh honey, just rest now,” the woman’s voice said and he felt a warm hand rest on his shoulder. That voice didn’t really sound like how he remembered their mother’s voice to sound like, but it was so many years ago now, the memory could have changed somehow.

“I’m dead,” Oscar croaked again, “aint I?”

“You’re alive, but now it's time to rest,” the lady said before Oscar let his eyes close again. The light in the room was just much too bright to keep fighting to keep his eyes open any longer.

Enveloped in darkness again, Oscar wondered where he was. If he wasn’t dead and he wasn’t still on the street, where was he? A hospital, perhaps. Nurses were usually women and they usually had white sheets and lights around. That made the most sense, he supposed. Allowing himself the momentary comfort of acknowledging that he wasn’t actually dead, Oscar felt himself getting tired.

* * *

Standing across from his newly awarded bunk, arms crossed over his chest, leaning back against the wooden frame, Jack Kelly was giving Morris a look that he knew was in for a discussion. Which would be awkward considering Romeo would have to write down what the both of them were saying. How was it that _The Jack Kelly_ couldn’t write?

Jack said something, which Romeo quickly scribbled down on the notepad and handed over to Morris. The knot of fear and guilt twisted deeper into his gut as he held the piece of paper in his hands. Morris knew he was shaking. He knew that if he tried reading the paper now, it would just look like a blurred mess.

Shoving his hand into his pocket, Morris laced his fingers into his brass knuckles tried to take a couple steadying breaths. Stop whatever was going on in his head before it started. That was always his best bet. Get ahead of his brain before he couldn’t stop the run-away train-wreck that it could create. Though, admittedly, he was never actually very good at that.

Shaking his head and slapping his hands over his ears to try to muffle the annoying noises that he couldn’t make any sense of, he felt the stick of metal connecting with his skull before he could stop the action. He’d just smacked himself in the head with his brass knuckles. As bad as he knew that was, the sharp pain radiating across the side of his head helped ground him.

Through the limited muffling abilities of his hands, Morris could hear Romeo’s voice. He had no idea what he was saying and it made him want to scream. Or cry. But definitely scream. What he wouldn’t give to be able to hear what Romeo was actually saying. What the small boy with the black hair, blue eyes and wide, cheeky smile wanted to tell him. Oscar’s voice. His mother’s voice. They all tried to speak with him and yet, he could never reciprocate. And he never would be able to.

A warm hand smoothed its way down his shoulder and Morris snapped his head to look at the other person who had sat down on his other side. _Specs_. The guy with the glasses and the curly blond hair from the docks. The newsie who seemed to figure out the hand motions before any of the rest of them. Plucking the crumpled piece of paper off the floor - where Morris realized he had dropped it before trying to cover over his ears - Specs read it over. At least it looked like he read it over. Morris had no ideas which of the guys around him could and couldn’t read. Or, which ones could or couldn’t write. It was hard to know, they all played themselves up at the distribution gates. Jostling, arguing, debating the headlines.

Suddenly standing and holding out his hand - a gesture the newsies seemed to like - Morris stared up Specs’ arm. He didn’t think he was ready to take his hands away from his head yet. Looking between the blond boy’s eyes and his hand again, Morris decided that he was likely indicating that he wanted him to stand and follow him. It seemed to be a common request lately. Following Specs towards the door to the stairs, he looked behind him and saw Romeo smiling in his direction followed by Jack scratching his head and looking concerned. They really just looked confused. All of them.

Specs opened the door to the room that Oscar was in then promptly turned around and walked back up the stairs. Left alone for the first time in a while, Morris took his hands away from his ears and looked across the room at his brother. Now covered in a blanket and swaddled like their mother used to do for them, Morris cracked a smile into the darkness of the room.

Only illuminated by the street lights outside the window, Morris slowly walked across the small, crowded room to stand beside his older brother. Face cleaned up a little, Morris noticed that the bruises, while still vibrantly purple and nasty looking, didn’t look quite as bad as earlier.

Now, he really had no idea what to do. When their mother died, it hadn’t been of sickness. It had been from a factory accident and she was just...gone in an instant. What were you supposed to say to someone who was injured? Oscar wasn’t even sick. They’d dealt with that before. Together. A fever or two here or there, it was easy enough to handle. Weisel beating them time and time again, just another weekend after he came home drunk. But this? This was unprecedented.

Morris didn’t understand or know what to do next. He didn’t know where he was going or even - barely - where he’d come from. It all happened so fast. One second, he was Morris Delancey, the thug that beat up on newsies. The next second, he was Morris Delancey, a newsie.

Was he even a newsie though? They all seemed to be living with his presence because Jack had started this whole thing. They didn’t really want him around. The second Oscar got better, they’d be left to fend for themselves. The Weisel-safety-net was gone. They’d truly be on their own this time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) I don't have a whole ton to say about this chapter other than my apologies if it is choppy/confusing. I was trying to write this while watching a movie/supervising tiny humans and kept getting distracted (and subsequently losing all trains of thought)
> 
> 2) I just wanted to do a little promo (for some of my own stuff. Yes. Lame. I know). But...this work is actually part of a series (currently with nine total works in the same Newsies timeframe/characters/settings. Stripes does make an appearance in some if you're willing to go looking for him but I figured that I'd just promo some of my other Newsies things here since this one is by far the most popular.
> 
> 3) Your Youtube clip of the day is a young Mike Faist (from Newsies) being goofy (and looking ridiculously tired, holy cow)  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBRsfBYzILY&list=PLFxtUQRT3x4LNwb8fUpEMOnIgAbFGFlRj&index=36&t=0s
> 
> 4) I really don't know why I keep bringing this up, but the city I live in is now officially on lockdown/quarantine and literally everything is closed. If you ever want to reach out to me (in the same situation, want to vent out some frustrations) I'm literally always around and something can be figured out if anyone wants to chat. Stay strong y'all. It's going to be hard, but we'll get through this :) <3 -MRT


	21. Is Freakin' 'gain (Jack, Romeo, Specs and Charlie)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for mentions of self-harm in Jack's section

“If youse promise youse ain't gonna freak, Mother Martha says youse can go sees Oscar,” Jack said to Morris, though, it was going to have to be translated into the written word through Romeo. Trying to refrain from frowning or making any physical indication that he was frustrated with Morris, Jack gripped his arms tighter than he already was.

He knew that if Charlie saw him doing that, he’d probably get an ear full about how he can’t go back to his bad habits. He used to do that all the time when he was locked up at the Refuge. Gripping his arms or his hands tight enough that he’d bruise himself, or, he’d dig his fingernails into his arms or the palms of his hands hard enough to draw blood. Neither were good solutions to feeling frustrated or scared, but it seemed to be the only thing that actually worked and calmed him down.

Romeo finally passed Morris over the piece of paper that detailed Jack’s message to him and the boy took it with shaking hands. Looking down at the paper, Jack watched as Morris’s eyes darted around, not following any lines in the order they were supposed to be read in. It was almost like watching a kid that couldn’t read looking over something and try to comprehend what they were seeing.

As Morris shoved his hand into his pocket, the paper flew to the ground and his shakes became more pronounced. If he’d gotten wet and then had to walk home in the cold, Jack would have expected to see that. Not now. This guy was spinning himself into a hole and Jack didn’t know how they were going to be able to get him out of it.

* * *

Romeo knew the signs of having your brain run away on you. Heck, it’d happened to him earlier that day. But Morris had been able to help him stop it. Helped him breathe and work through his memories. Shove them back into the deep, dark corner of his brain that they belonged in, not to see the light of day for a while.

But right now, Morris needed someone to help calm him down. And, as much as Romeo wanted to help him, he just didn’t think that writing anything out was going to help him. It seemed to wind the tall boy up even more.

He needed someone who could speak to him without talking or writing. He needed his brother.

Specs. He seemed to have figured out something with Morris. At least enough to not have to write things out to him. Turning away from Morris to look around the bunkroom that they were still sitting in, he tried to see if he could catch a glimpse of the matted, curly blond hair of their most intelligent newsie. The only guy that was currently not immobilized that could potentially get Morris down from where his head was.

Then, Romeo heard the cracking sound of metal connecting with bone. A sound he had become unnervingly familiar with during the strike and really not a sound he ever wished to hear again. Yet, here they were again, metal cracking against bone.

Snapping his head towards the sound, Romeo saw that Morris had covered his ears over with his hands, though, laced around the fingers of his left hand were his brass knuckles. The same ones from the strike. Yet, the one thing he noticed...the shakes had gone down a little.

* * *

“Wha’s goin’ on?” Specs asked, rounding the bunk that Albert and Henry shared to see Romeo and Morris’s bunk. The two boys were sitting on the lower mattress - Morris’s new home, hopefully for a while and Jack was standing across from the two of them, looking equal parts confused and concerned.

“Morris’s freakin’ ‘gain,” Jack muttered his report and Specs looked over at the two boys sitting on the bed and tried not to crack a smile at the situation. Aside from Romeo’s very concerned expression and the fact that Morris was obviously having trouble, he would have teased that the black-haired boy looked like the taller boy had hung the moon. But, it was very obviously not the time for joking right now.

Sitting down on Morris’s other side, he picked up the crumpled piece of paper off the floor at Morris’s feet. In Romeo’s handwriting, it read " _You can go see your brother if you promise to stay calm."_

Well, Morris was not yet downstairs and was not yet calm, so Specs wondered if the boy had had the opportunity to read the words before he’d freaked himself out again. Because, Specs bet anything that if he’d read the offer, they wouldn’t be sitting here on this bed right now.

While Specs found it hard to acknowledge the fact that the Delancey brothers were just like either of them, there was something in the way that they behaved around each other. That was who they really were, Specs knew.

Remembering their interaction from the pier earlier that day when they’d run into each other for the first time. How he’d reached out and that seemed to shake Morris out of his own head. Touching the thin, boney shoulder of the younger boy, Morris snapped his head towards him, his eyes looking in his direction without actually seeing him.

“C’mon,” Specs muttered, holding out his hand to Morris, standing up off the bed, “let's go see your brother.”

* * *

“We’s in ova’ our heads,” Charlie muttered to Jack that night. The bunkroom was silent except for Race’s soft snuffling snores and the pattering of rain against the window near Jack’s bed. Everyone was asleep, including Morris, who’d managed to drag himself upstairs after close to two hours of sitting with his brother. Now, Jack had his arms wrapped around Charlie’s torso, wedged between him and the wall.

“Yea,” Jack agreed, his soft huffing breaths sending shivers down the back of Charlie’s neck.

“Wha’ we’s gonna do wif the brotha’s?” Charlie asked.

“I finks we’s gotsta let’s ‘em stay wif us for now,” Jack suggested, “they’s can’t go back wif Weisel, tha’s for sure.”

“Mhmm,” Charlie found himself agreeing. Now that they’d all seen the other, real, human side of the Delancey’s, they couldn’t just...kick them back out to fend for themselves with the wolf that was their uncle. They’d be quite literally eaten alive. Besides, Morris had already figured out how to sell papers - to a certain extent - and Charlie had no reason to doubt that Oscar would be able to pick it up as well. Maybe they could turn the Delancey’s into newsies.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really don't have much to say today to y'all other than stay safe, stay isolated but not too isolated, and drink some water.


	22. Stay Here Today (Morris and Oscar)

When morning bells the next morning rang, Morris opened his eyes and promptly forgot where he was. From somewhere behind him, he heard a voice shouting something and Morris felt every muscle in his body contracting in fear. While logically, he knew it didn’t sound like Weisel, it seemed like his fight or flight reflex was still firmly turned on.

Then, he found himself looking at the inside of the Newsies bunk room from a seated position on the floor. Looking around, Morris realized exactly where he was and what had happened. He’d actually ended up falling asleep last night, which was a surprise and now, it was the next morning and in his fright, he’d fallen off his bunk. At least he was on the bottom.

An arm entered his field of view and Morris immediately recoiled, expecting said limb to come flying towards him a lot faster than it was. He didn’t expect it to stop before it actually made contact with him either. Following the limb towards the owner of it, Morris realized that he was looking up at Jack Kelly from his location on his rear end.

Scrambling to his feet and ignoring Jack’s hand, Morris brushed off his pants awkwardly and watched as the commotion of the bunk room started to pick up. Arguing over sinks or showers, dressing and getting ready for their day, Morris realized that it seemed as if they’d almost forgotten his presence. They’d all seemed so shaken up by it yesterday and now, it was as if they’d just...forgotten.

Maybe it was for the best, really. Aside from absolutely hating attention, Morris wondered if perhaps they were simply just adjusting to his presence. Which seemed unlikely, but that didn’t mean that it wasn’t impossible.

Climbing down the ladder beside him fully dressed, Romeo waved “hello” to Morris with a smile and Morris smiled back. He wasn’t entirely sure if that was the reaction Romeo had wanted, but whenever Oscar waved like that to him, it meant that you returned the greeting.

Heading in the direction of the sinks, Morris watched Romeo walk away and wondered - only briefly - how long it had been since the black-haired boy had gotten a new pair of pants...because those ones were a little small.

_C’mon Morris. Why’re you thinking like that? You know it's bad. If you let yourself think that way about another man - a newsie even - you’re just furthering the disease of sodomy. Close your eyes. Look away. And never look at Romeo or think about him like that ever again._

* * *

Oscar heard the chiming of bells and shot upright. The movement jostled his badly injured ribs, collarbones and arms, and he squeaked out a whimper of pain. He silenced himself the second he heard the noise escape from his lips, but he wasn’t sure he’d done it quickly enough.

“You’re awake,” a soft voice said - the same voice from the night previous.

“Yah,” Oscar grunted, trying to adjust himself so that everything ached less. The movements proved fruitless and Oscar refrained from whimpering again.

“The more you move, the more you’re going to injure yourself,” the woman said, and Oscar turned over his shoulder to look at her. She was an older lady with greying hair, deep lines in her face and a cross hanging from the chain around her neck.

“The rest of the boys usually go and get breakfast from the nuns at Trinity Church, but you are in no condition to be walking around right now,” the lady said, gently easing Oscar backwards until he was leaning against something. It felt like a step stool with a blanket over top.

“The boys? Where am I?” Oscar asked, pulling the blanket resting at his hips up to cover his shoulders. His very bare, very cold and very bruised shoulders.

“Lower Manhattan Young Boy’s Lodging House,” the lady replied and Oscar found himself launching into a sitting position once again, barely able to feel the pain in his upper body through the new-found fear and adrenaline coursing through his veins.

“I...why...how?” Oscar barely managed to stutter out through the conflicting thoughts bombarding his consciousness, threatening to make him run right out of the room, the Lodging House and all the way back to the distribution offices. Though he knew he would not be accepted back there with open arms, it was still the first thought he came up with and Oscar hated himself for even considering it.

“The twins found you last night,” the lady began to explain, “They brought you back here and I spent the night patching you up, so I’d really appreciate it if you’d lay back down so you don’t hurt yourself even more.”

Oscar complied without saying anything else and returned to staring at the ceiling. Crossing his arms over his chest, he wondered what kind of weird twist of fate he could have possibly encountered to be rescued by the people he’d been picking on his entire life.

* * *

_You’re staying here today. Keep an eye on your brother_ , the paper read, handed from Romeo to Jack and then to Morris. Taking the paper, Morris tried to get his hands to stop shaking.

Maybe this was it. Maybe this was where they were going to tell him to leave. But it didn’t say that. Not on the front side, not on the backside. Neither side said that. They just wanted him to look after his brother for the day. Okay. He could do that. He wasn’t entirely sure how good he was going to be at looking after the one person who’d looked after him his entire life, but it was worth a try.

 _Specs will come to check on you guys around lunchtime and the rest of us should be back around eight bells tonight,_ was the next message that was handed over and Morris snapped his head up to look for the boy with the curly hair and glasses. Specs seemed to have disappeared into the sea of mismatched newsies.

Then Jack waved goodbye, said something to Romeo, and then the bunkroom slowly started clearing out as the guys pulled their boots on and made their way down the stairs.

 _You’ll be okay on your own?_ Romeo wrote on their almost entirely covered sheet of paper out of Davey’s notebook from the night previous.

Instead of writing anything down in response, Morris just shrugged then nodded. He’d managed on his own before and with a lot less than what he currently had. He’d be fine.

 _I sell down near the docks if you need anything_ Romeo wrote, handing the entire piece of paper over to Morris before standing and walking towards the door. At the top of the stairs, the black-haired boy turned and smiled at Morris over his shoulder, giving him a wave before disappearing.

Morris huffed out a laugh under his breath as he watched Romeo leave. He sells down by the docks. They’d probably crossed paths dozens of times in the past and Morris had never noticed. That was always how it worked, wasn't it?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) so I found a Newsies bootleg recently (evil...yes, I know. Desperate times call for desperate measures) and one thing that I noticed was how angry Morris always was (when he was actually Morris and how bubbly and excited Stripes (or the Mike Faist newsie) was while Oscar was the one pushing Morris away from fights and conflict (calming him down, speaking to him off to the side). I just thought that it was interesting. Plus...Mike Faist tap-dancing = amazing. 
> 
> 2) I have this idea that I'm planning on doing (sharing because who knows what's going to happen in the future) that Romeo learns Oscar and Morris's sign language and becomes completely fluent in it. Inspired by Andy Richardson's fluency in ASL. 
> 
> 3) I'm basing Mother Martha on a character from Outlander (Mother Hildegard) if anyone knows the series, that's my reference.
> 
> 4) I know I've mentioned this before, but I am still extremely sick and doing literally anything drains all my energy. This two-page chapter has taken days of work. Depends on how I'm feeling, hopefully, there will be another soon, but there are really no guarantees


	23. Get Stripes Sellin' 'gain (Jack, Davey, Elmer, Jojo, Specs)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for implied/reference suicide attempt in Elmer's section

Jack watched Weisel from his place in the lineup at the distribution office and frowned. Despite the fact that his two nephews were currently missing, Weisel seemed unphased. Standing on ground level with him were just two other guys that Jack was fairly certain he had seen during the strike. It was like Weisel had completely moved on and had forgotten about his nephews. Which, thinking only a little harder on it, was likely what had happened.

“When we’s gonna get Stripes sellin’ ‘gain boss?” Albert asked from his place just behind Charlie in the line. Though, if Jack was going to be honest, they were having a really hard time forming a line this morning and it was more like a series of connected blobs.

“Soon as we can, I fink,” Jack replied before adding, “as soon as ‘is brotha’ get betta. Aint leavin’ eitha of them alone yet.”

That answer seemed to placate Albert and he turned back to his conversation with Mush, Sniper and Henry where the four seemed to be debating whether or not Patch was immortal.

“How youse figures youse gonna gets Stripes sellin’ ‘gain?” Charlie asked once the ridiculous conversation behind them picked back up again. Jack had a couple of ideas but he really didn’t know how it was going to work out.

He figured that Morris was able to learn phrases. It made sense that he was able to pick up things he’d heard often enough to be able to repeat them without knowing what he was actually saying. And it broke Jack’s heart when he realized that Morris’ _you want some of that too, ya lousy crip?_ comment was probably learned from hearing it directed towards himself from Weisel enough times to learn it. So they’d teach Morris how to hawk the headline by teaching him how to repeat new phrases. Now, they had Oscar too. Oscar could translate, they already knew that.

They were going to teach these boys how to be newsies.

* * *

Davey was really not certain about having not one, but two of Weisel’s nephews living in the lodging house. He understood that they were in serious need of some help but they were walking on extremely thin ice right now. Jack had said time and time again that Weisel had connections. He wouldn’t put it past the paper distributor to send someone after the boys if they got word of Morris and Oscar’s whereabouts.

Approaching the front of the line with Les and Patch at his side, he tuned out the chatter of the two small kids in favour of listening in on the conversation that the two new helpers were having as they worked on counting papers into stacks of fifty.

“-says they’s da left ‘em ‘ere when they’s real little,” the big goon said, placing a fresh stack of fifty onto the counter next to Weisel.

“Mrs. Medda says she boughts one of them real fancy cars,” Patch practically shrieked from beside Davey, drowning out the response of the smaller goon. Davey wanted to glare at his brothers’ friend but didn’t. By pretending to be talking about this car...or whatever it was that Mrs. Medda had bought this time, it was easier to eavesdrop unnoticed.

“He aint neva talks proper,” big goon said and Davey knew exactly what they were talking about now. The two missing brothers that he was just thinking about.

“And ‘e aint neva gonna talk propa eitha, so stop your yapping and get back to work,” Weisel shouted in the direction of the two gossiping goons, silencing them almost instantly.

* * *

Elmer saw too much of himself in Morris and Oscar. But more Morris. And it scared him. To think back to a time in his life where he would have gladly hurled himself in front of a trolley car instead of facing another day in a world that never hesitated to remind him that he was unneeded and unwanted.

He saw that in Morris. Too much of it.

He knew he had to say something to Jack. Because Jack understood. Jack knew that feeling too, but he wasn’t the greatest at reading people and probably not be able to see it until it was too late. It was almost too late before. When it was Elmer and not Morris. 

But when would he get Jack alone enough to say something? And what could he possibly say that would emphasize the weight and urgency of the issue? It would have to be after evening selling while they were headed back to the lodging house. Charlie usually went back early and Jack walked back on his own, late, after every single paper that could be sold was out of his hands.

He needed to prevent it from getting bad, if it wasn’t already.

* * *

Jojo fiddled with his cross through the fabric of his shirt, listening in to the conversation that was happening around him, but not actively contributing. He knew that they’d probably catch on at some point, he talked an awful lot most days, but Jojo was just so damn tired this morning that he didn’t think he’d be able to come up with anything meaningful in the end anyways.

“Next,” the voice of Weisel said, cutting through his lack of thoughts and Jojo realized that he was now standing at the front of the line, about to get his papers for the day. Shaking his head to clear the tired feeling, he reached around in his pocket for his quarter.

“Fifty papes please,” Jojo said, gently placing the coin on the coin box and heading down the line to get his papers handed to him from some massive guy that was pointedly not Oscar Delancey.

Even though Jojo knew exactly where said boy was, it was just startling to not see him standing there, ready to hand him his fifty papers, just like he had every morning and night for years. Jojo didn’t like change, even though in the back of his brain he knew that this was the good kind and not the bad kind.

* * *

Specs liked jogging. It cleared his head and while he would much rather be doing it on a beach with the sand between his toes, jogging on the cobblestones of Lower Manhattan was a perfectly fine alternative. He knew it was a bad idea to jog on a full stomach, but it had never bothered him before, so after scarfing down as much as he had wanted at Jacobi’s, Specs headed out for the lodging house.

Pushing open the heavy wooden door, he poked his head into Mother Martha’s study, the older woman sitting at her desk with a book in front of her, studying it intently. “

Where’s the brotha’s?” Specs asked, trying to keep the panic out of his voice. Mother Martha wouldn’t let them get far, so he knew there was really nothing to freak out about, yet here he was, heart pounding in his chest, thoughts running away on him.

“Upstairs,” Mother Martha said, turning around and looking at her before adding, “take a deep breath Matthew, dear, they are perfectly okay.”

“Thanks Mother,” Specs replied before taking off up the stairs.

Rounding the end of the row of bunks that he figured the two would be in, he saw a long, thin leg hanging off the side of the bunk, a toe almost poking through the boot that was still laced onto the foot. Approaching the bunk softly so that he didn’t wake them up if they were asleep, Specs felt himself break out into a grin.

Oscar was laying on his back against the wall, eyes just barely open, gently smoothing a hand through his younger brother’s brown hair. Morris was curled up into a ball against Oscar’s side, one leg hanging off the bed, which was just too small for two grown boys, his head resting on Oscar’s stomach, completely asleep.

Turning around to head back downstairs before he disturbed either of them, Specs headed back downstairs with a grin on his face. He was glad they had each other. Heaven forbid something serious happened to either of them. Specs was fairly certain it would break them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) I really like writing Morris and Oscar being good brothers to each other. Partially inspired by me and my brother and partially from the interactions of Mike Faist and Brendon Stimson in the behind the scenes videos (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEUo0BxYf44&t=13s)
> 
> 2) When Mother Martha calls Specs, Matthew, that was from something I saw somewhere that said that his real name was Matt Willis. I extrapolated from Matt to guess his real name was Matthew. 
> 
> 3) because I'm desperate, I wrote another story that I wanted to give a little promo here...its a fanfic of a super unknown movie (the movie has Mike Faist in it, which is how I found it), but if you're looking for something family-oriented and set in a foster care setting, it is called What More Do You Want From Me?


	24. Real Cold Outside (Morris)

Morris woke to the shouting of Jack again. Except for this time, he knew that it was Jack, and while his heartbeat started racing, he felt a soft arm around his back. Pushing himself to sitting, Morris wiped the sleep out of his eyes and saw that he was still asleep next to Oscar. Had he really been asleep since yesterday morning?

“Good morning,” Oscar signed and Morris smiled.

Jack continued calling out what Morris assumed was orders to the guys in the bunkroom and he felt Oscar tap his shoulder. Looking back towards his brother, he saw the heavy black rings around his eyes, purple bruise on his cheek and tried not to wince.

“Jack says its cold outside today,” Oscar signed before adding, “you should go ask him for a coat.”

“I’ll be fine,” Morris replied.

“No, you won’t. Go ask him,” Oscar said.

“It's fine,” Morris argued, scowling at his big brother and crossing his arms.

Then Oscar called something that caused Jack to turn around from where he was tucking his blue shirt into his pants by the sinks and started to walk over to them. Holding a brief conversation that Morris could only assume was about him, Jack walked away.

“If you’re going to go selling with them this morning, you can’t go out in the snow wearing that,” Oscar explained. Morris frowned down at where he’d laced his hands in his lap and refused to acknowledge the fact that his brother was right. The only pair of clothes he had with him were his thin pants and a grey button-down shirt. It was nowhere near warm enough to wear outside if there was as much snow on the ground as everyone was making it sound like there was.

“Jack is going to get you a coat, hat and mitts,” Oscar added and Morris looked up to glare at Oscar properly this time.

“I don’t need you to fight my battles for me, Oscar,” Morris signed, trying to convey as much anger as possible.

“You’re not invincible and yet you won’t accept help. So no, I’m not going to stop fighting your battles with you,” Oscar signed back angrily and Morris turned back to glaring at his hands.

A pile of folded clothes landed on his lap and Morris snapped his head up to look at Jack, shirt now tucked into his pants and suspenders thrown over his shoulders. Brown pants, plaid shirt and a navy blue coat sat in his lap. He wished he knew how to copy the words for _thank you_ , but he hoped his and Oscar’s sign for the same phrase would suffice.

Jack smiled awkwardly at him and said something in reply. Morris looked over his shoulder to see if Oscar caught what Jack had said.

“Get changed, you’re going selling with them,” Oscar said. Morris smiled at his brother and then looked back at Jack. Standing with his pile of clothes, Morris stripped his shirt from Weisel off and looked at Oscar with a smile.

“Are you sure you’re going to be okay without me?” Morris asked.

“Don’t worry about me,” his brother replied with a small smile, but his eyes looked sad.

“I’m sorry for yelling at you,” Morris said, pulling the new shirt on over top of his striped undershirt.

“You were upset,” Oscar replied.

“Yeah, but that doesn’t make it right,” Morris said finally as he unclipped his old suspenders off his old pants and attached them to the new brown ones. The pants were a little short, but that was to be expected given how long his legs were.

“You look like a newsie,” Oscar said with a laugh.

“Yeah, I guess,” Morris replied, looking down at himself, pulling on the navy blue coat.

“You’re going to be a good newsie,” Oscar commented before adding, “now get out there, I think they’re waiting for you.”

* * *

Morris was handed a biscuit and a tin cup filled with what felt like warm liquid. Smiling at the nun that had passed it to him Morris took a sip of what turned out to be coffee and blew against the surface of the water, feeling the steam hit his face.

Oscar was right. It was cold outside. Really really cold. The snow was falling in big, clumpy flakes and landing in Morris’ hair and on his nose. Looking up at the sky, he blew a puff of air out of his mouth and watched it curl around above his head as a snowflake hit him straight in the eye. Morris snorted out a laugh and turned back to his cup of coffee.

He felt someone tapping on his shoulder and he turned around to see Jack and Romeo standing behind him. Nervously, Morris cracked a smile and waved at them.

 _You can’t come to the distribution office,_ the paper that Romeo passed him said, but Jack is going to buy your papers for you today. Morris smiled and nodded before digging into his pocket for the quarter he’d put in there earlier in the day. He’d only sold papers to these guys every day for years, he knew how to do the math and he knew how to fit in. Handing the quarter over to Jack, the older boy took it with a smile.

 _You’re going to sell with Jack today,_ the rest of Romeo’s message said and Morris gave the two boys a thumbs up, shoving the rest of his biscuit into his mouth all at once.

Romeo laughed at that and Morris smiled again. Maybe being a newsie wasn’t going to be so bad after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) I realize that this is a little bit of a shorter chapter than usual, but I got laid off today so I wanted to write at least a little something to raise my spirits. 
> 
> 2) I hope everyone is staying safe and isolated (but not so isolated you get emotionally worn down) and washing your hands! 
> 
> 3) Here is your YouTube video of the day. I've been doing a lot of YouTube watching and managed to stumble across this! (skip to 3:24 if you want to see the relevant content) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQdUVM0PaEo&list=WL&index=38&t=293s


	25. Hundred Fifty Papes (Jack, Specs, Charlie and Spot)

“Hundred fifty papes please,” Jack said, placing three quarters on the counter. Inside the bag he’d thrown over his shoulder, there was another bunched in the bottom for Morris. He hoped none of Weisel’s guys noticed that it wasn’t quite hanging limp off his shoulder.

“That’s more than usual, _pretty boy_ ,” Weisel snarled and Jack tried to swallow against the lump in his throat.

“Good ‘eadline today,” Jack countered, trying to not let that statement get to him. It was over. That part of his life was done. The Refuge was closed. Snyder was behind bars. Snyder was damn lucky to be behind bars too. Jack couldn’t get at him there.

“Sure,” Weisel grunted before calling towards the two new goons, “hundred fifty papes for the _pretty boy_.”

Angrily grabbing the papers from the goon who handed them to him, Jack stuffed them into his sack. Flipping through one last paper that was not in his sack, he tried to scope out the best headline. It really wasn’t a great paper this morning, but it was better than those three weeks they’d sold the trolley strike papers. He never wanted to see those words printed as front-page news ever again.

“Weisel’s jus’ pushin’ youse buttons,” Jack heard Charlie whisper from beside him. Turning to look at the blond boy with the lopsided smile and hazel-brown cap backwards on his head.

“What do youse means?” Jack asked, shoving the paper that he had been reading back into his sack with a little more anger than he felt like was strictly necessary.

“He called you...you know,” Charlie replied, “an’ now youse looked like youse gonna rip that pape ta shreds.”

Jack didn’t reply and instead shoved his hands into his pockets with enough force that he was surprised he didn’t wreck his jacket. It was just that he’d been doing better. He’d been having fewer nightmares lately and - for the first time since he’d lost his parents - had actually been sleeping. Which was a minor miracle.

And now he had to work another minor miracle. How to teach Morris Delancey, a sixteen-year-old goon who had a bad grasp on the English language to sell papers. While still making enough of his own money to make sure that all of his other guys were fed and housed that night. He had no idea how he was even supposed to accomplish this task without Romeo, Specs or Oscar helping.

* * *

Specs thought that Jack was crazy. It wasn’t an uncommon thought. No, it was actually a relatively common thought. While this wasn’t as life and death as the strike or as important as delivering Jack’s letter to Crutchie while he was in The Refuge or tracking down Elmer when he ran away that last time, this was definitely Jack’s brand of crazy.

He wasn’t sure what compelled Jack to decide that he was going to be the one that would teach Morris how to sell. Because, while Jack was extremely good at hawking the headline, he seemed to not be the best at understanding how to communicate with Morris. It was simple really. Easy sentences, easy signs, it got the point across. Obviously never as well he was able to talk with Oscar, but it worked.

As they all headed out of the distribution yard after collecting their papers, he saw Morris sitting on the retaining wall across the street from the gates. His grey newsie cap was resting sideways on his head and his navy blue coat was hanging awkwardly off of his frame. The pants were too short and they had yet to find him a new pair of shoes, but he looked like a newsie now. The boy was swinging his legs aimlessly and was looking up at the sky as the snow fell on his face. He was grinning up at the dark grey clouds as his hair was peppered with snowflakes. If Specs only saw his face, he would have said he was a young child. He wasn’t, none of them were anymore.

“C’mon,” Jack hollered at their newest addition causing the boy in the navy blue coat to snap his head up to look at them. He hopped off the wall and jogged across the street, accepting the offered canvas bag from Jack. Touching his fingers to his chin before dropping his hand back down - a sign that Specs now knew meant “thank you” - the two set off into the snowfall.

* * *

Charlie was good at selling papers. He liked to say that it was because he was just that charismatic but in reality, he knew it was because of his leg. Jack knew that. All of them knew that and while Charlie was grateful that none of the other guys faked a limp for sympathy, he was fairly certain he would trade with any of them. Not that he’d ever subject this...mess of a leg to anyone. There was just no way.

He knew that it was a good idea for Jack to take Morris along and show him the ropes, but Charlie had a feeling that they were just too similar and had too many unpleasant run-ins with each other in the past. Strike aside, the Delancey brothers had been picking on them and messing with them for years. He trusted Jack to not mess with Morris, now that they better understood why he lashed out at them, but he just couldn’t shake the feeling that something was going to go horribly wrong.

Maybe he should have volunteered to teach Morris what to do. They were similar enough. Well. Not really. Morris was tall, skinny and jittery while Charlie was considerably shorter and rarely ever got the jitters. But they were both _different_ , and that was what Charlie thought Morris should capitalize on. Not too much, but enough that he didn’t say something to the wrong person and get himself beat up.

Now that he realized where Morris’s _lousy crip_ comment likely originated from, as well as all his other colourful statements throughout the years, Charlie was worried that something was going to set off the boy in the stripes and cause him to say something to Jack that he didn’t mean, or say something to a potential customer that could get him locked up. He knew that Morris knew the _pretty boy_ phrase. The last thing he wanted to witness was Morris throwing that one out around Jack and getting a fist to the mouth for his troubles.

* * *

Spot tried not to laugh, watching Jack and the tall crane-climbing-newsie selling papers. Or, the crane-climbing boy trying and failing to sell papers, followed by Jack showing him what to do, followed by the boy failing _again_. It was almost comical at this point.

Having had a wonderful selling morning over in Brooklyn, Spot had crossed the bridge early to surprise Race and say a cheerful and snowy hello to the rest of the guys when they congregated at Jacobi’s for lunch. A combination of a decent headline and the recent dusting of snow, it was easy enough to play everything up, easily selling his entire stack of one hundred papers in what must have been record time.

He was walking down by the docks, just having passed Romeo, when he saw Jack standing with the kid who was an entire foot taller than him. It looked like they were arguing about whatever was on the paper that morning that Jack was holding in his hands and shaking in front of the boy. The boy looked frustrated and was incessantly tapping his foot against the sidewalk, hands shoved deep into his pockets.

Spot was just glad that it finally seemed like Jack had figured out who this boy was and was helping him sell papers instead of letting him climb cranes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) The reference to the "pretty boy" comment is elaborated on in the first work in this series, but essentially (sparing all triggering details) it was something that Snyder called Jack in the Refuge. 
> 
> 2) I don't have a YouTube of the day for you, but I wanted to find a clip from the movie I Can, I Will, I Did where the Mike Faist character has on this navy blue winter coat that looks really old fashioned and that inspired me to "give" Morris the same type of coat in this story. 
> 
> 3) Lastly, I hope everyone is holding up okay. Today marks one month since the province I live in declared a state of emergency. Somehow, it feels like its been longer and shorter time...all at the same time. Stay safe, wash your hands! <3


	26. Fifty Three Cents (Morris and Oscar)

Morris wanted to go to bed and sleep for days, even though he had already done that just yesterday. He knew selling papers was tiring. He’d been doing it already. But today, he didn’t get a break. Jack didn’t let him have a break, the older boy following him around and watching him like a hawk. He didn’t like it, but he wasn’t able to tell Jack no, so he let it happen.

On their feet all day, Jack seemed to like to try to drag him right into the middle of a group of people and then expect him to get something accomplished. Morris was exceedingly good at freezing, panicking and beginning to shut down. The noises shot straight through his heat like that damn fire poker and he felt like he was walking on top of the crane without holding onto the support bar. Like one little breeze was going to knock him off the side at any given moment.

Then he was dragged to Jacobi’s at lunch where he was given the side eye more times than he could count and barely managed to stomach the pieces of meat that the nice old man had set out for them. He wondered if anyone noticed that he didn’t have anything to eat, but then again, the boy in the beige coat with the black hair didn’t eat anything either and Jack didn’t seem to have noticed. Maybe he would be able to get away with it.

By the time Morris and Jack walked back to the lodging house, Morris was certain his feet were going to fall off, his brain was going to come out of his ears and his knuckles would be bruised purple from his brass knuckles.

But, in the end, Morris did have to admit it was worth it. Pulling the coins he’d made for the day out of his pocket, he counted up fifty-three cents, which would be enough for room and food for both him and Oscar, and enough for another fifty papers tomorrow morning. With four cents to spare. He had to admit, it was more than he had ever made on his own.

Climbing the steps into the bunkroom with Jack, Morris smiled as he saw his brother, Davey, Specs and Buttons sitting in front of the fire playing with a stack of cards. He wasn’t sure what game they were playing, but he was happy that his brother was up and moving around a little, even if it was just from one sitting spot to another.

“Hey, how’d it go?” Oscar asked, placing his cards down face down in front of him to question Morris with both hands.

“Pretty good actually,” Morris replied, “made fifty three cents.”

“Well look at you Mr. Big Shot. When I’m healed up you’re going to have to teach me!” Oscar said, looking at Morris’s outstretched hand holding the evidence of his decent selling day. It made him briefly wonder how much money Jack would have made, had he not been following him around.

“You wanna sell too?” Morris questioned, the statement only just making it inside his head as he shoved his collection of pennies and nickels back into his pocket.

“Of course. Besides, I aint going back to Weisel anytime soon,” Oscar finished, picking his cards up again, scanning them and then placing one of them face-up on the pile that was on the floor in front of them.

“Good,” Morris said before adding, “Aint think Weisel wants us back anyways.”

He’d caught a glimpse of their uncle through the bars at the distribution office this morning and the man looked normal. Surprisingly normal. Morris really wasn’t sure what he was expecting, but he briefly hoped he had seen that his uncle was at least concerned for their well-being and whereabouts, given that they had been his wards for almost a decade.

“Did the nun tell you what she was serving for supper?” Oscar asked, “supposedly she tells Jack everyday when he gets back.”

“Maybe,” Morris said with a laugh, “Couldn’t have heard her anyways.”

* * *

Oscar cracked a grin so wide the bruising on his cheek hurt at hearing his little brother laugh. It was a sound he hadn’t heard in ages, and, while directed towards himself in a deprecating manner, he knew Morris well enough by now that it really didn’t make him feel that upset.

He had had a boring day. Once all the newsies had left for the day, Oscar attempted to wash himself down in the sink. He didn’t want to approach Mother Martha and ask her to re-do his bandages, so he didn’t dare go anywhere near the shower out of fear of completely soaking himself. After dropping his bar of soap in the sink basin more times than he could count and hitting the side of his head against the faucet, Oscar felt more human than he had in days. Weeks even.

Which led him to his next problem. What was he going to do for the rest of the day? He could only fold Morris’s discarded clothes so slowly. Eventually, he’d given into his boredom and had approached Mother Martha, asking her if there was anything he could do to help out while the newsies were gone. She’d given him the task of helping her fold linens, followed by chopping up food in preparation for supper. It was boring and mundane, but at least it was better than doing nothing in the bunkroom all day.

Before he knew it, the two littlest newsies, Patch and Les, if he remembered correctly, burst through the front doors, calling their hellos to Mother Martha as they ran at full speed into their study. Patch, the little one wearing the eye patch snugged tight over brown hair, almost crashed right into the chair Oscar was sitting on while folding a pillow case.

“Careful kid,” Oscar had said, gently patting the top of Patch’s head, steering them away from impending danger.

“Fings seem farther ‘way than they ares sometimes Mr. Delancey,” Patch’s replied.

“Youse can call me Oscar,” he said, watching as the two little ones, their pockets weighed down hilariously with their earning from the day, jittered around like Morris.

"M'kay Oscar!" Patch parroted back with a massive grin on their face. 

“I’ve told you why that happens Finlay,” Mother Martha said from across the room, “Do you remember what the word for that is?”

“I aint got no depth perceptions no more,” Patch said with more enthusiasm than Oscar figured one could muster over having to wear an eye patch. Perhaps he needed to take a page of Patch’s book of unbridled enthusiasm.

Oscar lost track of time then, as more of the newsboys returned home, each telling and re-telling stories of their day, laughing and joking. Suddenly, in that moment, Oscar realized that these guys were their own little family. They all depended on each other and they all looked out for each other. In the back of his mind, he wondered if that was why he’d let Morris go with them this morning without a fight or argument. He knew his little brother would be safe with any of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Interesting history fact of the day...depth perception was "discovered" in 1838 with innovations of binoculars. Whether or not it would have been common knowledge or textbook knowledge in 1899, I'm not entirely sure.
> 
> 2) I've said it so many times already but I actually started working on it today...Patch is finally getting their own story! Also, on the Patch train of thought, Mother Martha calls all the newsies by their "real" names, which is why she calls Patch "Finlay."
> 
> 3) I found this recording (with no video either, sadly) of Mike Faist and Kara Lindsay singing "Something to Believe In."  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nSe0qAYwpF8&list=PLFxtUQRT3x4LNwb8fUpEMOnIgAbFGFlRj&index=31&t=0s
> 
> 4) unfortunately, I am still quite ill, but this is my only outlet for anything, so I am still writing it when I have the energy! : ) Stay safe everyone!


	27. Better Than Yesterday (Jack, Specs and Jojo)

“When do ya’ finks tha’ we’s’ll be able to get Oscar out sellin’?” Jack asked that morning in the breakfast line. Davey had let Les run ahead with Patch, hanging back to confer with Race, Charlie and Jack on the two young Delancey’s they had under their roof before approaching the distribution office.

“Once Motha’ Martha says he can,” Davey replied, shuffling forward a little when the line moved.

“But when’s tha’?” Race asked, twisting his cap in his hands, letting the snow fall onto his head. Davey wondered if the boy with the curly blond hair needed a cigar or something. It looked like all his muscles were shaking.

“Wheneva’ he’s betta’,” Davey said, trying not to let his voice take on a sharp edge. He wasn’t angry. Not at all. It was just, he firmly believed that they had to teach Morris to fend for himself and sell papers properly before bringing Oscar out into the mix. If Les was in Morris’s position, he knew that he wouldn’t take his eyes off his little brother all day. As it was, he only let Les go off selling with Patch, knowing the two were inseparable anyways.

“It's fine,” Jack muttered, pulling off his cap and running a hand through his hair before pulling it back onto his head, “Sellin’ wif Morris didn’t go all tha’ well yesterday. Kid really can’t hear worth beans.”

“Send ‘m wif Romeo or Specs,” Charlie pitched in for the first time that morning. Leaning heavier on his crutch than normal, Davey wondered if they were in for a change in the weather soon.

“Specs,” Jack called out to the boy with glasses, standing four or five ahead in line. The boy turned around, said something to Finch - who he was standing with - and stepped out of line, walking towards them.

* * *

“I want you to take Morris this morning,” Jack said, “and if you two haves trouble sellin’ ‘em papes, I’ll cover for youse. I jus’ fink ‘e learns wif youse betta than wif me.”

“Of course, sounds like a plan Jack,” Specs replied with a smile.

It had been ages since Jack had asked him to help out with training. The last time had been a couple of months ago when Charlie brought Patch back to the Lodge with him from the Refuge. Learning to work around only having one eye was really what Specs had really helped Patch with, but they had adapted so quickly that after only a week, they’d gone off on their own anyway.

Looking around, Specs saw the wavy brown hair piled on top of a head that peaked out above all the others around him. Well. It would be hard to lose Morris. That was a definite plus. Patch was easy to lose - they could scoot under legs and around trolley’s with a speed Specs couldn’t fathom. All he had to do was look for the unkempt brown hair.

 _Hi_ , Specs waved to Morris as he approached the tall boy. At his side, laughing at something, was Romeo.

“G’mornin’ Romeo,” Specs added, receiving a smile from the shorter black haired boy and a lopsided smirk from the silent boy.

 _How are you?_ Morris appeared to have asked, holding his hands out and shrugging before pointing towards Specs.

 _Good, you?_ Specs replied, hoping that he answered the question in a fashion that Morris would understand. He received two thumbs up in response.

“Romeo, do youse gots any paper ‘round?” Specs asked the smaller boy. As much as he didn’t want to have to rely on writing to speak with Morris, he thought it would be much too hard to do without.

“Yeah, here,” Romeo replied before saying, his voice entirely level to hide the implications of his comment from Morris, “Stripes here aint havin’ a great day Specs.”

“Fanks Romeo,” Specs said, taking the paper and graphite from Romeo, writing, _Jack wants me to go selling with you today. Hopefully it will work better than yesterday, yeah?_

With a small smile, Morris nodded his head yes.

* * *

“G’mornin’ Mother Anne,” Jojo said, accepting a hard biscuit and coffee from the nuns, drawing his obligatory cross over his chest out of force of habit. Smiling at the old lady who had raised him, he almost wanted to run up the stairs and give her a hug. For old times sake. Though, he was fairly certain that the older lady wouldn’t have been as receptive to receiving a hug from a newsie that had not bathed in a few days than a baby that had been left on the steps of Trinity Church.

“How are you this morning Josephino?” Mother Anne asked, making a small motion for him to come stand beside her so she could continue handing out breakfast to those in line behind him. Taking his place to her left, it almost felt familiar.

_Growing up in the church as an altar boy, Jojo would help the nuns hand out breakfast to the newsies everyday since he was able to hold mugs of coffee until he had become a newsie himself at ten. It was how he had met Jack for the first time._ _The brown-haired boy, three years his senior, had showed up in the breakfast line once years ago and had been coming back since._

_Jojo had been handing out food to the newsies and had been there the first day that Jack had arrived at breakfast wearing a bright blue shirt. He’d never seen the boy wear anything other than a steady cycle of grey or brown for years. Then, it occurred to him that the shirt hadn’t fit well on his frame - Jack only started filling out the shirt in recent years - and that the only other guy that had worn a shirt of that color hadn’t been in the breakfast line in a couple of days._

_Then, Mother Anne had pulled Jack aside and had spoken to him quietly as Jojo continued handing out breakfast. A skilled eavesdropper, he managed to only catch snippets but understood that Jack had been elevated to leader of the Lower Manhattan Newsies - earning himself the coveted blue shirt - after the boy who used to wear it had passed away. Jack wore the shirt everyday for years before buying a new one after the original had been lost during his time in the Refuge._

“Am doin’ real good Mother,” Jojo replied, taking one bite of his biscuit, which was just as hard as it had been yesterday.

“That is lovely to hear Josephino,” she said, passing over a mug of coffee to Albert and then Henry with a smile, “It's good to see you smile again dear.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) If I've accidentally misgendered Patch at any point PLEASE SAY SOMETHING. Patch uses they/them pronouns but this computer loves to autocorrect they/them pronouns in sentences to whatever it chooses and sometimes I don't catch it. If you see any, please let me know. 
> 
> 2) I wanted to do a "Jojo growing up with the nuns" story and I did start it. Then, I remembered that I have very very bad memories associated with church/religion and couldn't finish it. So, have what I manage to write before I couldn't continue  
> 2.5) Anyone catch the Hamilton reference?
> 
> 3) I am still sick and have been put on bed rest, so it has taken me five days to write this because I get maybe a half-hour of writing done before I can't do anymore and need to sleep (again).
> 
> 4) How are y'all handling quarantine? Is it going okay? Are you bored out of your mind (yes, me too). You're not alone and you're valid for feeling this way. Stay safe everyone and please wash your hands. Thank you all for reading and being awesome and supporting this story  
> \- MRT


	28. Mustard Yellow Hat (Morris)

Standing in the line to receive breakfast, Morris bumped his shoulder into Romeo’s with a laugh. They’d walked to Trinity Church together that morning after dressing and washing up. By the time that they’d made it into the lineup, standing right behind the twins - Mush and Sniper - Morris’s cheeks hurt from smiling all morning.

The smaller black-haired boy smiled at him and shoved back into Morris’s shoulder with the same force. Adjusting his newly acquired felt winter coat, Morris decided, on a spur of the moment weird urge, to snatch Romeo’s yellow hat from his head. So he did. The look he got was first that of confusion but morphed into something else that Morris couldn’t read or understand. He didn’t think that anyone had looked at him that way before.

Holding the hat above his head as high as he could - which was admittedly quite high up into the air - Morris smiled and laughed again. Romeo jumped and tried to grab it back as they both started to cackle. The higher Romeo jumped, the closer and closer he came to crashing directly into Morris. Both boys were laughing the second that Romeo jumped too close and collided straight into Morris’s chest.

Pulling away and holding still, Morris watched with wide eyes as Romeo looked up at his face, chocolate brown eyes almost searching. So Morris deliberately schooled his face to not look spooked or scared, even while his heart was racing a mile a minute, fight or flight response threatening to take over. Smiling, Romeo laughed, the sound reaching Morris’s ears and shoving the fight or flight response down. Forcing out a laugh, he awkwardly handed Romeo’s hat back before scratching his own head.

Looking at his feet, knowing that their roughhousing had gone a little far, he felt Romeo poke him in the side. Handing over a piece of paper with Romeo’s graphite markings on it Morris took the offering and held it up, reading it.

 _Sorry I jumped into you. Are you okay?_ Romeo had asked. Turning to smile at Romeo, his facial expression more genuine than before, Morris nodded. Yeah, he was okay. A little awkward and a little surprised, but okay. Once the smile crossed his face, a real, genuine smile, Morris found it hard to suppress it. He just...liked being around Romeo. He was nice.

Passing the paper back, Romeo folded it and shoved it deep into his pocket again as they shuffled forwards in the lineup. Romeo muttered something and Morris turned his head back to look at the black-haired boy. The second their eyes locked, the two both started laughing again, barely able to catch their breath between ridiculous giggles. Snatching Romeo’s hat off his head again and placing it on his own only caused them to laugh harder. At this point, Morris wasn’t even sure what was funny or what they were laughing at, but they just kept each other going.

From under the brim of Romeo’s yellow hat, Morris could see a brown coat, a brown pair of pants and a white striped shirt. Looking up and wiping his hands across his face to clear the tears of laughter from his eyes, he saw Specs standing beside them in the line, his hands stuffed deep into the pockets of his coat as a couple of flakes of snow started landing on their heads.

 _Hi_ , Specs waved once Morris got enough control over his laughter to actually pay attention to what the other newsie wanted. From beside him, Morris could hear Romeo trying to control his giggles, resulting in him snorting a little while covering his mouth with his hand. Watching Specs’s face for his reaction to their antics, Morris just saw that the blond-haired boy was just looking at them with a small smile on his face.

Bracing himself, Morris’s first reaction was to wait for an impact. He wasn’t used to being able to have fun and goof around without anyone getting mad at him for it. Back with Weisel, he and Oscar were only able to goof around on the days that their uncle would head out to the bar early and come back late. He had missed having fun.

Smiling back, Morris waved to Specs.

Specs said something to Romeo to which the black-haired boy didn’t reply verbally.

 _How are you_ , Morris attempted to ask, simplifying his and Oscar’s symbols far enough that he hoped Specs could understand it.

 _I’m good. How are you?_ It seemed that Specs had attempted to reply, though, Morris wasn’t entirely sure, so he gave him a general thumbs up in a hope that it conveyed that he was okay, but if that wasn’t what Specs had asked, it wouldn’t have made sense.

Turning back to Romeo, Specs asked him a question to which Romeo replied while digging through his pockets to retrieve the paper that they had been using all morning to write to each other. Passing it over alongside the piece of graphite that Davey had given them back after that first day when Romeo, Morris and Crutchie had walked back to the lodging-house together.

 _Jack wants me to go selling with you today. Hopefully, it will work better than yesterday, yeah?_ Specs handed the paper over to Morris and gave him a chance to read it. Swallowing hard as he read it, Morris tugged Romeo’s hat off of his head and gently handed it back to its owner. He didn’t know how to feel about that. He didn’t know how Specs could help him out in any way.

No one could help him. His parents had tried. Before they left him and Oscar with Weisel, there had been a couple of doctors that they’d brought him to. Each doctor, one after another, told them that there was something wrong with him. That Morris was broken and no one would be able to fix him. After going to enough doctors, Morris realized that they were true and he started to believe them. He was broken and he was unfixable.

Forcing a small smile and forcing himself to look up at Specs, he shook his head yes and decided that it was worth a try. He had nothing to lose at this point. Looking over at Romeo, he saw the chocolate brown eyes staring back at him from underneath a recently returned yellow newsies hat.

Romeo nodded yes with a smile and Morris felt a genuine happy feeling tugging at the corners of his chest. It was a hard feeling to identify, and it scared Morris that it was something he couldn’t identify. Between the ugly feeling of emptiness combined with this new feeling, it made Morris’s head spin and feel like he wanted to throw up. It seemed like his new normal and Morris wasn’t sure that he liked it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Guess what?! I'm still alive! After enough hospital/doctor visits to last a lifetime + 5 exams written, I am ready to get writing again! Let me be completely honest, this is not an awesome chapter. I'm trying to get over writer's block/burn out from writing and the best way to do that is just...write more!
> 
> 2) I thought up this idea after watching a series of Newsies videos, particularly ones that showed just how different in height that Morris and Romeo were. 
> 
> 3) Even though Patch wasn't in this one, I finally wrote Patch's story! It is work 11 in this series. 
> 
> 4) Lastly, thank you, everyone, for the comments/kudos/hits because this story passed 1600 hits while I was absent and that makes this my second most-read story and that is absolutely amazing! Thank you for reading and I hope you have a good day. Stay safe <3


	29. What Are You Reading (Specs, Race, Spot and Romeo)

As the bell on the nearby church chimed eleven, Specs turned to Morris and motioned that it was time to go eat. He thought that they’d had a very successful morning, with Morris even doing his last few sales entirely on his own. Their successes were starting to show as throughout the day, the mood that Morris had gotten himself into that morning seemed to be lifting and the boy was even smiling a little.

Walking towards Jacobi’s, Specs tried to keep working on getting Morris to copy him, as they were now walking down significantly less crowded streets. If Morris screwed up what he said, no one would know except Specs. That was the thing, Specs figured, where Jack had had trouble yesterday with Morris. He seemed extremely conscious and aware of everything at all times, and if Specs asked him to do something that made him uncomfortable or put himself out there in any way that he wasn’t entirely prepared for, Morris would just shut down.

And it wasn’t that Jack was mean, because he wasn’t. It was just that it was obvious that he didn’t understand the necessity behind teaching Morris very very slowly. Because, if Morris got overwhelmed, he would start either trying to talk, resulting in completely wrong and often rude sentences coming from his mouth, or, he would shut down completely, tuck his chin into his chest, stare at his feet and tap his toe. When he got that far into his head, Specs realized quite early on in the day, it took him almost a half-hour of sitting on the curb with his hands over his ears to break out of whatever was haunting him.

But, as Specs watched Morris complete his last three sales before eleven bells entirely on his own and without Specs prompting him through any of it, he realized that Morris had not only picked up, but also retained much more than he had initially assumed. He just had to want to do it.

As they approached Jacobi’s, Specs motioned for Morris to stop walking for a second and pointed up at the sign hanging above the doorway.

“Jacobi’s,” Specs said slowly and calmly.

The “J” sound in Morris’s reply was clear, but the rest was muddled.

Specs still smiled at him and gave a thumbs up anyway because not only did he try, but he got the first sound and that was better than he would have had just minutes ago.

* * *

Race watched from his place on top of a table as the door to Jacobi’s swung open to Specs and Morris. Neither looked frazzled or upset, so Race considered that an absolute win. Compared to Morris’s appearance at lunch yesterday - which looked like a bomb less than two seconds from going off, he knew that it was a good thing that Specs had taken him this morning.

That morning, before they all left, Race had extended a lunch offering to Oscar, hopefully to surprise his little brother if it was another bad day. While Oscar may have not been well enough to be on his feet all day, a short walk to the deli wouldn’t kill him. The look on Morris’s face when Specs pointed out Oscar made it all worth it. Watching the tall boy in the navy blue coat practically run across the room towards where his older brother was standing with Romeo, Race wondered where the mean Delancey brothers that they used to know had gone.

“How’d it go?” Jack asked from beside Race once Specs got in earshot.

“Pretty good, I’d say,” Specs said before shoving the better half of an entire croissant into his mouth, effectively ending the conversation.

“So, youse turnin’ them Delancey brotha’s nice then?” Spot asked from his place on the table on Race’s other side. Close enough that Race could feel his body heat, but not too close that it would look improper.

“Yeah,” Jack said, “They’s aint bad guys, jus’ gots bad uncle, I reckon.”

“Side’s, Morris is doin’ real good, and e’s a real sweet kid,” Specs said, swallowing his massive mouthful of food, “an’ Oscar aint bad eitha’, jus’ got beats up real good by Weisel an’ needs some ‘elp.”

* * *

Spot crawled up onto the railing of the Brooklyn Bridge, sitting as close to Race as he could as they looked out over the water. Gently leaning his head onto Race’s shoulder, he smiled as one of the ferries passing underneath their feet tooted its horn briefly.

“Do youse finks Jack’s gone crazy?” Race asked quietly after a few moments of silence.

“In general or wif this Delancey fing?” Spot replied.

“Wif them Delancey brotha’s,” Race said, “I means, they tormented us for years Spot. They locked up Crutchie. And youse knows what Crutchie means ta Jack. I jus’ don’t gets it.”

“Jack’s gotsa big heart and he jus’ saw those boys was hurtin’. I finks that he’s forgots all their other bad fings because he saw theys needed ‘elp,” Spot explained, taking one of Race’s hands and holding it close to him, “I fink Jack knows wha’ e’s doin. Is Jack crazy though? Yeah. Probably.”

That made Race laugh, the noise like music to Spot’s ears. If he could only hear one thing again in his life he would have chosen that sound. In an alternate universe, Spot would have wanted to lean over and kiss Race, right there on top of the world.

Actually, there were a lot of things he would have wanted to do. He wanted to talk to Jack and Crutchie about their relationship, he wanted to reach out to Romeo and a bunch of the other guys in both Lower Manhattan and Brooklyn...but he just couldn’t. It was impossible and was never going to happen. Spot was just going to have to accept that.

* * *

_What are you reading?_ Romeo asked on the extremely marked up piece of paper, handing it down to Morris from his position on the top of the bunk bed. The tall boy, whose legs barely fit themselves onto the bunk grabbed the paper and read it before closing the book most of the way and showing it to Romeo. _The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood._

Handing the paper back without adding anything to it, Morris returned to his book with a small smile. Romeo, in the back of his mind, knew that Morris could read, because, of course, he was reading their notes every single day. But watching him read a book as thick and worn down as the one in his hand made Romeo wonder just what was bouncing around inside Morris’s head. That was a big book and it looked well-loved.

 _Do you like that book?_ Romeo wrote, handing the paper down to Morris, distracting him from his reading yet again, though, it didn’t look like it made him upset in any way.

Tilting his head up to look at Romeo, Morris gave him a smile and a thumbs-up, accompanied by a nod.

Looking down at the brown-haired boy, his fringe flopping into his eyes as he was practically hanging off his bed, Romeo couldn’t prevent himself from smiling. It was hard to understand what he was feeling, the burning sensation in the middle of his chest, but he shook his head and pulled himself back onto his bunk and rolled onto his back, staring at the roof with a smile on his face. No matter how hard he tried, every time he called the image of the younger Delancey brother smiling, his multicoloured eyes shining bright, Romeo couldn’t help but crack a smile as well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't have much to say today, but I do have a plan now for the remaining chapters, so an end is in sight for this part of the series!


	30. A Note in The Shoes (Oscar and Morris)

“Why’d you do it Jack?” Oscar asked, not concerned in the least that he was most certainly invading Jack’s personal space at the moment. It had been on his mind all day, watching his brother interacting almost seamlessly with the rest of the newsies and feeling only the cold race of paranoia up his spine.

“Do wha’?” Jack asked through a mouthful of mashed potato.

Looking around to ensure that everyone was still more interested in Davey and Les’s game of dreidel than what he was asking Jack, Oscar rephrased, “why’d you take Morris in?”

“Didn’t know it was ‘im,” Jack explained, swallowing his mouthful and looking at Oscar.

“Tha’ note tha’ youse gave ‘im begs ta differ,” Oscar said, pulling the folded piece of paper out of his pocket. He’d found it that morning while folding Morris’s old pants. It had fallen from the pocket after one harsh shake and Oscar couldn’t stop himself from unfolding it and reading it if he tried.

> _Morris, I hope you know how to read or else this will make no sense. You dropped your brass knuckles last night when you tripped near the bin. I wanted to give them back to you then, but you ran off. I know this probably sounds really strange and unnerving, but if you are the boy in the striped shirt down on Water St., come to Jacobi’s Deli down on Liberty at lunch today. If not, just ignore this and have a good day._
> 
> _\- Jack Kelly_

“He was sellin’ day old papes, do youse realize tha’?” Jack whispered, his voice taking on a slightly harsh edge, “and he aint doin’ it good neither. So we followed ‘im and, since youse said youse reads the letta, youse knows we’s found ‘is dropped brass knuckles. There was somethin’ off Oscar. A Delancey kid aint jus’ sell papes for no reason.”

“Oh,” Oscar said, beginning to realize that, yet again, he’d spoken too soon. He’d jumped to conclusions and had made Jack mad.

“Yeah Oscar. Oh. And, youse knows, ‘e’s not a bad kid. He jus’ needed ‘elp. You don’t sell papes for the heck of it. Youse sells cause youse aint gots no otha choice. So save ya brotherly protection because aint nuffin goin’ wrong.”

Closing his eyes and swallowing hard, Oscar said, “Look Jack, I’m real sorry I snapped. I just...I just didn’t want nuffin ta ‘appen ta ‘im, ya know?”

Jack said nothing and instead shoved another spoonful of potatoes into his mouth, making it obvious that he was done talking.

With a heavy sigh, Oscar stood from where he was next to Jack and wandered back towards the bunkroom. He just wanted to climb into his bunk and sleep. He’d messed everything up again and, as far as he knew, the single most effective way to make his thoughts stop was to sleep.

Crawling onto the mattress that he’d been granted, Oscar let the weight lift off of his chest and the pain rushes out of his limbs as he relaxed. Everything still hurt. Just when he thought he was healing and getting better, he’d get surprised with stabbing pain everywhere. It was just easier to sleep. So he closed his eyes and let himself drift off.

* * *

The nearby church bell chimed twice as Morris walked out the front doors of the lodge, bag hanging off one shoulder. He hadn’t slept that night hardly at all and by the light shining through the window from the warehouses, he’d read. Or, he had tried to read. It became exceedingly difficult as Morris had let his mind wander off to the dark corners it only managed to gain access to at night. So, while his book had been open in his lap, there had been very little reading completed.

But he had managed to accomplish one thing while not sleeping. It had happened around the time that the nearby church quietly rang one bell that morning. Morris had climbed off of his bunk, heart pounding from the scare of the bell, and had headed to the washroom, his bladder unable to be ignored any longer.

In the washroom, while relieving himself, Morris realized that if he wanted to fit in with the rest of the guys, he’d have to prove to them that he had left Weisel behind. That he wasn’t a rat and that he wasn’t planning on doing anything bad to any of them. Because, as nice as Specs and Romeo were to him, it hardly escaped his notice that some of the other guys seemed extremely wary around him. And Oscar. If anything, they seemed more uncomfortable with his brother than Morris himself. Really though, without any ability to understand what people were saying, it was extremely difficult to get a good grasp on any conversations.

Gently pulling himself up to eye level with Romeo’s bed after his return from the washroom, he spied the pad of paper that Davey had given them with the graphite resting on top. Grabbing it from beside Romeo, making sure the smaller boy didn’t flinch or stir, he rested back on his own bunk and smoothed the paper out on his lap.

> _Dear Lower Manhattan Newsies,_
> 
> _We have not always gotten along. For as long as I can remember, Oscar and I had to beat up on you. I know that that is not an excuse for our actions, but it is an explanation. Our father left us with Weisel, who I cannot bear to even address as my uncle any more after our mother died and we were moulded into the vicious bullies that confronted you every day._
> 
> _I want to change. I do not like being a bully and I never have. I yelled things at you I never should have and to this day, I still do not understand most of the things I said. Oscar protected me for years and sheltered me from the worst of Weisel’s anger, but I still learned enough. I learned how to punch, push, drag and yell, though none of those actions were my own. I never wished ill or harm on any of you though I cannot deny the hurt and pain that my actions caused._
> 
> _Over the past week, you have all shown Oscar and I the care and compassion that a true family should show its members and I only wish that one day I’ll have the opportunity to make it up to you for all the awful things I have done._
> 
> _If I could turn back the clocks, I would, but sadly I cannot. This letter says the things I cannot, no matter how hard I try and I hope that if you take the time to read this, you’ll accept my apology. If you cannot accept this, I do not fault you in any way and will leave at the first indication without a fight._
> 
> _\- Morris Delancey_

Folding the note and placing it in the shoes at the base of Jack and Crutchie's bunk, Morris stuffed the notepad, his old clothes and his book into his bag. Throwing it over his shoulder, he slowly climbed down the stairs and pushed open the front door. Stepping out into the cold night air, Morris stuffed his hands in the pocket of the navy blue coat and started towards the docks. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Don't hate me, but two parts of Newsies canon I have COMPLETELY forgotten about...Katherine and the political cartoon job. Next chapter, Katherine and Jack will reunite (finally).
> 
> 2) It took a while to figure out good phrasing for Morris's apology and ultimately, the idea of writing it in letter format just worked the best. It went through all variations before I settled on this. 
> 
> Thanks for reading!


	31. Pier 11 (Finch, Elmer, Specs and Romeo)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TWs:  
> \- suspected suicide attempt (entire chapter)  
> \- implied suicide attempt (Elmer's section)

The second Finch woke, he knew something was off. It was hard to tell what, but it was just one of those mornings where he woke up and could tell that it wasn’t going to be an ordinary day. Call it superstition, but between his suspicions and Crutchie’s leg, they were both usually more right than wrong. Henry called it the “Finch in the coal-mine” feeling. Finch just knew that he was usually proven right.

Climbing down off his bed, deliberately bumping into Buttons on his way, Finch stretched and let his back crack. He wasn’t the biggest guy at the lodging house by any means, and even for him, the bed was a little cramped. Not that he or any of the other guys really knew any different. He was just glad that he had a roof over his head and foot in his stomach.

Electing to not shower or wash off that morning, Finch started the slow process of bundling into his coat and thick pants. From what he could hear last night, the wind had picked up off the Hudson and had blown snow everywhere. They may even have icicles hanging from the buildings. Finch was eager to find out. That and he wanted to get down to the nuns before their morning coffee froze.

Working on the last set of buttons on his burgundy coat, Finch heard Jack ask, “anyone seen Morris?”

Looking over his shoulder to Romeo and Morris’s bunk, he noticed that the bottom mattress was neatly made up with the blankets pulled firm down the sides and all of his things, not that there were ever very many, completely missing.

“Jack,” Finch called before watching the sleep-messed mop of brown hair poking around the end of the row of bunks to investigate the notification, “‘is stuffs gone.”

Jack huffed and ran his hand over his face before turning around and going back the way he had come from, a piece of folded paper crumpled in his clenched fist.

* * *

Elmer was good at connecting the dots. Maybe not as good as Jack was, but he wasn’t particularly awful either. When he heard Jack call, “anyone seen Morris?” his heart fell through his ribcage and if it wasn’t for his skin, likely would have landed on the ground entirely. There was something about the morning and Jack’s frantic shout that scared him. That brought him back to a worse time that he had hoped he’d never see in Morris, yet didn’t not expect.

He remembered the morning that he’d tucked a piece of paper in Jack’s shoe before walking out of the lodging house doors towards the Brooklyn Bridge, fully expecting to never return. But he had, and it took a while, but he started feeling better. Jack didn’t let him sell alone for a while and in the end, it did help. Only on really bad days did the dark corners of his brain threaten to edge forwards again, but he was usually able to chase it away.

Running around the end of the bunk without anything on except for his loose pair of winter trousers, Elmer almost collided into Jack. Pulling his pants up to a more respectable height with one hand, Elmer looked into Jack’s eyes and said, “Brooklyn Bridge.”

Understanding hit Jack’s face and he turned around to call, “Romeo, Specs, Oscar!”

The three requested boys appeared and Elmer adjusted his grasp on his pants to grab for the piece of paper clenched in Jack’s fist. Unfolding it, he skimmed down to the last line. It was signed by Morris Delancey. Elmer hoped that it wasn’t what he thought it was.

* * *

Specs’s glasses were fogged as he jogged towards the docks with Romeo. Jack had promised he’d cover any lost wages and sent them on their way to the docks before heading down to Mother Martha to inform her of what was happening, just in case. Bundling up tight and folding an extra blanket into a paper bag that was under Henry and Albert’s bunk, the two of them took off towards the rising sun and the dock cranes.

Despite his size, Romeo managed to keep up with Specs even on the iced roads and blowing snow curling around their feet. Approaching the crane that Specs had seen Morris climbing before, he looked up and shielded his eyes from the rising sun, inspecting the top as best as he could. He hoped that they’d find Morris here, because, as much as he’d warmed up to them over the past week, they still didn’t know where he liked to go other than to the cranes.

At the base of the Pier 11 crane, though, Specs’s wish came true as he saw a figure with a navy blue coat curled into itself, shaggy brown hair dusted in a thin layer of snow. There were no footprints in the snow yet, so Specs figured that Morris must have been sitting there for quite a while. If he was lucky, he was going to catch a wicked cold and be chilled through to the bone. If he wasn’t lucky...well...Specs didn’t want to think about that.

“Morris!” Romeo chirped from beside Specs, rushing towards the tall boy, looking so incredibly small where he was sitting.

“Morris, wake up,” Romeo shouted, sliding down onto his knees in the snow and reaching out to shake Morris’s shoulders.

The brown mop of hair lulled forward and side to side a little but without any other signs of life, Specs could help but hold his breath. Not for Morris, because he would be in a better place, but for Oscar and Romeo, who both cared for the silent boy more than either of them expressed.

* * *

“Morris c’mon,” Romeo said and he could hear his voice cracking.

He couldn’t lose Morris. He just couldn’t. Morris couldn’t be gone. It was impossible. This had to be a dream. A nightmare. It couldn’t be real.

“Romeo, lemme jus...check somethin,” he could hear Specs’s voice say from somewhere behind him.

No, it was real. As Romeo fell backwards into the snow, the dampness soaking into his pants and freezing his legs, he realized the reality of the situation. Morris may not wake up and that scared him.

Reaching out to his neck, Specs pressed just under Morris’s jaw before jolting backwards and practically shouting, “he’s alive! ‘Is ‘eart is still goin’.”

“Get ‘im up get ‘im up,” Romeo said, pushing himself to his feet and pulling the blanket out of the bag that Specs had had over his shoulder.

Wrapping Morris in it as quickly as they could, Specs pulled Morris over his shoulder with a grunt. Getting his balance, they started back towards the lodge as fast as they could.

Helping keep Morris steady, Romeo was struck with a sudden thought. _I like him. I like Morris Delancey_. And for some reason, as much as it scared him, it wasn’t something that was really shocking.

 _I like Morris Delancey_ , Romeo tried out once again inside his head. Yeah, that sounded about right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) I've been thinking about this for a while, but how would you guys feel about me naming the chapters? So instead of "Chapter 1" the chapters would get a title that better describes what's going on so you could go back and find a chapter you really liked. Totally open to suggestions and opinions on this
> 
> 2) I have no idea what happened at the end there, but ultimately, it wasn't as horrible as the first draft so it stayed
> 
> 3) Hope everyone is doing okay in these super weird times <3 thanks for reading!


	32. Time to Process (Oscar and Morris)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TWs for hypothermia/suicide attempt

When Jack had woken them that morning, standing next to the bunk Oscar had been given, underneath Davey, the first thing the boy in the blue had said was, in a hushed tone, “Oscar, I found this.” Then, he’d passed the paper over and Oscar had taken the time to read it.

Morris had run away, Oscar knew that the second that he’d read the last line. He didn’t need Finch or Jack to point that out. Somewhere outside the safety of the lodging house, Morris had managed to get himself and it terrified him. Because there was no telling where he really was now. Through Jack’s barked out instructions and orders, Oscar had sat on his bunk, staring at the wall just beyond his feet. Morris was out there, in the snow, and Oscar was still too beat up and incapacitated to go looking for him.

If Oscar didn’t know what to think when Jack had handed over Morris’s letter, he most certainly didn’t know what to think when Specs and Romeo had brought him back to the lodging house wrapped in a blanket and frozen to the bone, less than an hour later.

“He’s alive, barely,” Specs shouted at the front door, Oscar and Mother Martha rushing forwards to help take the weight off the shoulders of the boy in the glasses.

Laying Morris down in Mother Martha’s study, in the exact same place that Oscar had been just days ago, he looked down at his brother's face, pale, drawn and looking so entirely shattered, he wondered not for the first time what Morris had been thinking. But, he didn’t ask questions or speak as all three of them listened to Mother Martha’s instructions, sending them off in all different directions.

He rarely was able to get glimpses inside his brother’s head and into his thoughts. If Oscar was good at hiding his physical hurts from Morris, Morris was twice as good at hiding the psychological hurts from Oscar. He just didn’t realize how bad Morris had let it get. Heating up the small pot of broth over the open fire, Oscar wondered if there was anything he, or anyone else, could have done to change the outcome of this morning.

Returning to the study with the boiling pot, he watched as Mother Martha worked on bandaging Morris’s hands and feet, blistered, red and raw from the cold. Closing his eyes briefly, he placed the pot on the countertop next to Mother Martha, who seemed in no rush to use it.

As the nun rolled his brother with the help of Romeo, he knew the exact moment when everyone in the room saw the massive scar of burnt flesh across Morris’s back from Weisel’s fire poker all those years ago. Morris had cried for days after that and he wondered, in the end, if it ever truly healed. Because, even to this day, the wound looked red and angry.

Dropping Morris’s soaked shirt and tank top, Specs and Romeo got to work drying Morris as Mother Martha gathered a cup of the heated broth and passed it to Oscar. “Try to get him to drink some of this,” Mother Martha instructed before continuing on to bandaging and warming up Morris. It was a frantic dance to try to save his brother’s life and Oscar was just given a part in it.

“C’mon Morris,” Oscar muttered, gently holding up his brother’s head and trying to convince him to drink it, even though he was still out. Morris’s hair, soaking wet and threading between Oscar’s fingers, he noticed how strangely cold his brother’s head was.

It scared him, but Oscar refused to think about it too long. He couldn’t, because then he knew he’d just scare himself. Oscar wasn’t allowed to be scared. He had no time to be scared. He’d spent years being scared and this was not the time.

* * *

The first thing that Morris felt was excruciating heat. Like he was quite literally on fire. He desperately tried to jerk away from the feeling but found that regardless of what his head decided it wanted to do, none of his muscles cooperated. Movement was impossible, it seemed. No matter how hard he tried, whatever he did, he couldn’t move.

He was alive though, that much was for certain. The last time he remembered closing his eyes, Morris had expected to ever open them again. He was finally getting what he deserved. No reason to keep living, he was going out in a way that would harm the least amount of people. Just another street kid that didn’t wake up the morning after a night of snowfall. Wouldn’t even make the obituaries in the paper.

Morris would be lying to himself if he wished that it hadn’t happened. He didn’t have to lie to himself, Morris supposed, but he could think of at least a half-dozen people that he would have to lie to. Oscar, for one. Oscar, who had spent his entire life trying to protect him and keep him safe. Or Specs, who had put so much effort into teaching him how to move on and learn. Romeo, who always read with him in the evenings and Jack who had done so much for him this past week. So many people had tried to help him and Morris knew that they couldn’t possibly know the truth behind what he’d tried - and failed - to do.

He felt a tear roll down his cheek, and Morris blinked his eyes open against the burning heat against his skin. His fingers and toes were tingling like they did when he sat badly on a bench or slept awkwardly on one of his arms. But still, regardless, he couldn’t force any of his limbs to do anything.

“Morris,” he heard Oscar say from over his left shoulder. He knew, without a doubt that it was Oscar’s voice, he’d been trained to recognize and listen for it for years. Combined with his name, which was one of the only words that he had ever been able to understand, there was no doubt that it was Oscar.

Morris said something in reply. He knew that he’d made a noise, though, whether or not it was a comprehensive sentence or word, Morris just couldn’t tell.

A warm hand, which felt like it was burning him, brushed his hair off his forehead as Morris opened his eyes. Looking back was the still-bruised and battered face of his brother, confirming his earlier assumption. Closing his eyes again, Morris suddenly felt extremely guilty. Guilty about putting his brother in this position. The position to care for him yet again.

He wished it had worked. That he had stayed out there for longer. Gone out sooner. Whatever it was that he was trying to do, planning to do, thinking about doing, it hadn’t worked and Morris felt another tear of frustration slip down his face. The universe seemed against him at every step of the way and as he forced his eyes open again, all he could see was Oscar’s sad expression staring back at him.

“Sorry Oscar,” Morris tried to sign, though, with the disconnect between his brain and his arms, he wasn’t entirely sure if the message had made its way through or not.

“What happened?” Oscar signed back and Morris closed his eyes. As immature as he knew he was being, Morris didn’t think he could talk about it yet. Couldn’t tell the truth, but almost couldn’t lie yet either.

He just wanted to rest. As the familiar creep of dark sleep approached the corners of his vision, Morris gave in and let himself sleep. Give himself time to process. Heavens knew he needed it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) I renamed all the chapters by popular request. The first part of the title is what happened or a quote from the chapters, followed by a list of who "speaks" in that chapter. Sometimes the titles get a little long and you can't see the whole thing, but its the best that I could do : )
> 
> 2) I'm gonna say that Morris has given himself a case of hypothermia, which is why they're trying to heat him up and why he feels like any "warm" touch is burning him
> 
> 3) Things are going uphill for Morris and Oscar next chapter, I promise. I know it's getting a little dark/dreary, but it will get better!
> 
> 4) Here is a Youtube of the day, from Newsies when they were at the Papermill Playhouse and all so ridiculously young.  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjJnnp_2dtQ&list=PLFxtUQRT3x4LNwb8fUpEMOnIgAbFGFlRj&index=46


	33. Let's Talk (Jack, Davey, Oscar)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a note, when characters are speaking out loud, their words are not italics, when they are speaking using sign language, they are in italics, just because it switches back and forth significantly and I wanted to make this easier to read and understand.

Jack never thought that in a million years, he’d be asking for help from Oscar Delancey. It just never occurred to him until very very recently that he wasn’t the person he thought that he was. Oscar wasn’t a bad guy, he’d just done some bad things. But now, he realized that Oscar was the only one who could truly get through to Morris and, well, there were some things that they definitely had to work out.

Morris had slept a lot, spending what seemed like the vast majority of the day in his bunk. Every time that Jack would come home from selling just to check-in, Morris was asleep. Mother Martha said that his body, already weakened, had taken quite a battering, spending an entire night in the freezing cold and that since he was out of danger of having the cold take him, he just needed to recharge.

“We needs your help,” Jack said, sitting down on Oscar’s bunk, Davey climbing down from the one above to stand in front of them.

“Okay?” Oscar said, a confused look spreading across his features.

Jack understood where it came from, considering the last conversation they had the night before Morris ran away and honestly, they had barely spoken since. As Jack got to see Oscar up close, he noticed with a smile that some of the bruises on Oscar’s face, formally on his cheekbones and sticking out of his shirt collar around his neck, were fading to yellow and green. It was a strange look, that's for sure, but it meant that Oscar was getting better and they could get him out on the streets as soon as humanly possible. He had to get out of the lodging house soon, though, with Morris sick, he was glad someone had eyes on him all the time.

* * *

Davey didn’t actually mind Oscar. Out of the two Delancey brothers, he found that he could cooperate with his lower bunkmate better than Romeo’s bunkmate. He found that they probably had more in common than they originally thought. Taking care of a younger brother, leaving a family behind, not really being a newsie from the get-go. Being different.

So, as Jack sat next to him, claiming that they needed his help, Davey put his book down and climbed off his bunk to provide backup. Not exactly impartial backup, but the second set of eyes and ears if they needed. And the look that Oscar was giving Jack at that moment, Davey was thinking they may have been in for a good old fashioned Delancey smack-down. Not that that had happened since the strike, but it wasn't out of the question yet. At least, Davey didn’t think so.

“We needa talk wif Morris,” Jack said and Davey knew that he had looked over at him like he’d grown a second head. Of course, they all knew that Morris had tried to run away in the dead of winter, but why Jack thought they needed to have a talk with him was beyond Davey’s thought process this early in the morning.

“M’kay,” Oscar replied, crossing his arms over his chest, “why do youse needs me?”

“Cause youse can talks wif ‘im, right? Like, wif youse ‘ands?” Jack asked and suddenly it clicked into place for Davey. Of course, they needed Oscar, because it seemed that anytime they tried to write something out for Morris, the anticipation of waiting for the paper to be handed over was too much and the younger Delancey brother just started mentally shutting himself down.

“Yeah,” Oscar replied, though, to Davey at least, he couldn’t tell what Oscar was saying yes to.

“Tonight, when we’s comes ‘ome from sellin’, we’s gonna have a chat wif Morris, ‘kay?” Jack stated.

Davey wanted to punch Jack for phrasing it in that way. If someone had said that to him about Les, Davey would have said no without a second thought. The look on Oscar’s face seemed to say the same thing, but Jack held firm and eventually, Oscar nodded.

Satisfied, Jack walked away, likely to finish dressing for the day and Davey turned to Oscar to say, “Youse don’t have to say yes jus’ cause its Jack Kelly you know?”

“I know. But wha’ Morris did was real dumb. If he won’t listen ta me, maybe ‘e’ll listen ta Jack,” Oscar said, leaning back against the wall of his bunk and crossed his arms, eyes glazing over as if he was deep in thought. Leaving him be, Davey climbed up the bunk to start getting ready for the day.

* * *

Oscar wasn’t sure what to think as the newsies started returning to the lodge that evening. Honestly, he was starting to dislike not knowing what to think. He used to have everything under control, and now that he wasn’t the one in control, he didn’t think he could handle it.

Jack motioned him over while kicking off his boots. Standing gingerly from Morris’s bunk, where he had been sitting and watching his little brother sleeping fitfully during the day, he followed Jack.

“How’s he doin’?” Jack asked, cocking his head to indicate Morris.

“Betta,” Oscar said, “sleepin’ less and ‘is fingers and toes are more a normal color ‘gain today.”

“He awake?” Jack asked.

“Kinda,” Oscar replied, starting to lead Jack towards where Morris had been all day.

Now, he noticed that Romeo was sitting up on his bunk, head dangling over the edge, watching Morris. Oscar didn’t know if he was seeing things or not, but it was hard to miss the incredibly fond look in Romeo’s eyes. Yet again, he didn't know what to think or make of that, so he just shook it off. 

“Morris, c’mon buddy,” Oscar whispered, gently touching Morris’s shoulder and giving him a little rock back and forth.

 _“What time is it?”_ Morris asked, rubbing his eyes and pushing himself to sitting before wincing when he put too much pressure on his hands.

 _“Evening. The guys just got back from selling and Jack wants to talk with you,”_ Oscar replied and watched as Morris pulled a sour face, though he quickly shook it off.

 _“Guess I don’t have a choice do I? Just have to sit here and listen?”_ Morris asked, face turning sad.

 _“Morris, you don’t have to do anything if you don’t want. But Jack just wants to talk to you and he knows how much you hate talking on paper, so I’m going to help translate. Okay? Make it a little easier, yeah?”_ Oscar replied, hoping that it came across okay. The last thing he wanted was to scare Morris into his own head.

 _“Yeah, okay,”_ Morris replied with a nod. Oscar smiled at his brother.

“He doin’ okay?” Jack asked, having just watched their entire interaction.

“Yeah,” Oscar replied, sitting down on the bunk facing Morris, “I’m ready whenever you are.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) I know I pulled away from the usual format of having the odd chapters for any newsie except for the Delancey's, but I really needed Oscar in this chapter, so he got a little place.
> 
> 2) This story has about 2-3 chapters left to go! I won't be ending Morris, Oscar and Romeo's story here, but call it the temporary interlude between the Delancey's being Delancey's and Newsies. 
> 
> 3) Here is a little Youtube of the day for y'all. Its the behind the scenes of the cast recording, but I just really like it and think its sweet and worth sharing  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnHsfI62BGo&list=PLFxtUQRT3x4LNwb8fUpEMOnIgAbFGFlRj&index=30&t=0s
> 
> 4) I hope everyone is hanging in there! These are sure strange times, so make sure you reach out to someone if you're struggling.   
> -MRT <3


	34. I Want To Learn (Morris and Oscar)

Wandering down the stairs the next morning, Morris smiled a little to himself as he realized for the first time that he didn’t feel like an invader in the lodging house. Last night, Jack forgave him. On behalf of the rest of the guys, he was forgiven and they were willing to let the two of them stay. For the first time, Morris felt something in his chest that he didn’t understand or know what it was. Acceptance perhaps? He didn’t know. He didn’t think he’d ever felt this way before.

Walking into Mother Martha’s study, he noticed that the older woman was up and about already, various pots of boiling water already on the fire. As the door creaked open, Mother Martha turned around and faced him, a smile on her face as she pulled a roll of bandages out her apron, not saying anything. Morris smiled back and nodded, their conversation completed in silence and yet managing to convey exactly what they needed to say.

Sitting on the bench that she always made him sit on the past few days to bandage his hands and feet, Morris held out his hands. The older lady took his left hand and pulled the wrapping from where she’d tucked it the last morning and watched as the formerly red and purple skin was closer to white and pink now. He wondered if that meant that his hands were starting to get better. Or worse. They actually looked worse now, the more that Morris thought about it.

Covering his hands in some kind of cream, once again, they got wrapped up again while Mother Martha passed him over a piece of paper. _Morris, you are ready to be out selling. Make sure you dress very warmly. It will be much easier for you to get cold now._ Reading over it, Morris smiled before signing thank you and taking off up the stairs back to the second floor of the lodge.

Morris couldn’t prevent the smile spreading across his face even if he tried. He wondered if he smiled enough, if his face would get tired. He didn’t know. He never tried. Never had a reason to smile that long. Now he did. He was allowed to go selling again, and whether or not he would be going with Specs or alone, he was getting back out there.

It worried him still though, where had all his negative thoughts gone? They couldn’t just have disappeared. That was impossible, he thought. One of these days, they were going to come back. Morris didn’t like that idea, but he didn’t know if there was any other alternative. He’d been miserable for as long as he could remember. There was no way that that could have possibly just gone away overnight. Maybe he just had to take advantage of not feeling like he’d just been hit by a trolley and have a good day for once, even if it wasn’t guaranteed to last.

Pulling open the door to the second floor, Morris rounded the row of bunks that his and Jack’s were down, he skidded to a stop when he saw Romeo and Oscar sitting on the floor near their bunk, Oscar holding onto Romeo’s hands and manipulating them into one of their signs. Approaching the two, Morris nudged Oscar’s foot, causing his old brother to look up at him.

 _“How are your hands?”_ Oscar asked, taking the paper Morris held out to him after giving him a sore thumbs up in reply. His note from Mother Martha.

As his brother read over it, he said something to Romeo.

The black-haired boy looked up at him with a massive smile and signed, “good morning Morris.”

Morris watched Romeo with wide eyes as he felt the smile that had fallen off his face briefly return. Romeo was learning how to talk to him. No one else had ever bothered to do that before. Not even their own uncle. Though, Morris had decided that Weisel hadn’t been their uncle in a really long time. But Romeo was trying to learn. Trying hard. And Oscar was teaching him. A new feeling bubbled up in Morris’s chest, though it wasn’t the one from earlier. He had no idea what this one meant.

 _“This is really good Morris. You’re going selling again. Thats great!”_ Oscar said, handing Morris his paper back, _“you should probably show Jack and then start getting changed.”_

* * *

“I wanna learn sign language,” Romeo had said when he approached Oscar’s bunk that morning.

At first, Oscar wanted to reply with a short but snappy “why.” Instead, he said nothing and looked down at his hands. Signing to Morris had been almost a decade long invention of trial and error. He didn’t know if he’d even be able to teach it to anyone if they asked because it was second nature by now. Muscle memory. How do you teach muscle memory?

“Can youse teach me?” Romeo asked, looking down at his own hands before quickly adding, “I fink I knows some already. Ya know, jus’ from watchin’ you an’ Morris talkin’ and stuff.”

“Yeah?” Oscar said, realizing that perhaps Romeo was more observant than he’d been giving him credit for.

But the question still stood. Why? Why would Romeo, out of all the guys in the lodging house, be the one to decide he wanted to learn. Maybe…. No. Thinking about it made it true. So Oscar refused to think about the very likely possibility that his baby brother could be taken away from him forever and put behind bars. Because...that just wasn’t something that Oscar was ready to face when so much had changed in the past week and a half. He just couldn’t think about that.

“Yeah,” Romeo said before touching his chin with an open palm before moving his arm at the elbow to bring his hand down to face Oscar. Which was remarkable. Because Romeo was right. Completely. Even copied the way that Morris would never bring his hand down any lower than perfectly level. Romeo had been watching. And understanding.

“Sit,” Oscar said, patting the bunk beside him, “let's start with something simple, yeah?”

“Sure,” Romeo, sitting and looking at him with patient expectance.

“How about ‘good morning’?” Oscar said, subconsciously doing the sign anyways. It’d been happening more and more often recently, that he’d been unable to turn off sign language when he turned spoken English on and did both at the same time. The sign was pretty simple, in Oscar’s opinion. Touch your chin then bring that same hand down to meet your other hand before tucking the same hand into the crook of the elbow on the other hand. He truly had no idea when this sign of theirs had come into use, other than at some point, it just materialized in both of their vocabularies.

Showing it to Romeo a couple times, explaining which part belonged to ‘good’ and ‘morning,’ the black-haired boy picked it up and was able to copy it almost perfectly.

Then he asked, “how do you sign Morris’s name?”

“Like this,” Oscar said with a smile, putting his hands together into a little bird shape and making it flap a little.

Then, Romeo signed, _“Good morning Morris,”_ and Oscar finally understood. That his little brother probably felt the same way about the small black-haired newsie that Romeo felt about him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Its almost done!! This "chapter" of Morris's story is almost over and I couldn't be more excited. This had been one hell of a journey and I'm so excited that its almost completed. 
> 
> 2) After posting this chapter, this story is also my largest word count story I've ever written. At an average of 2.5 pages per chapter, I couldn't be happier with the outcome. 
> 
> 3) Here is your Youtube of the day - Newsies practicing for the Thanksgiving Day Parade.   
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdj_SgUQE80&list=PLFxtUQRT3x4LNwb8fUpEMOnIgAbFGFlRj&index=13


	35. We'll Be Okay (Davey, Race, Specs, Charlie, Romeo, Jack, Spot)

Standing in line for breakfast, Davey ruffled his little brother’s hair as he half-heartedly listened to him chatter to Patch about whatever crossed his mind. It was sweet, adorable even, that the two of them had become such fast friends after Charlie brought Patch home with him from the refuge. Everyone needed a friend.

It seemed that Morris had found a friend too. Looking a couple of clusters up in the line, he watched as Morris held Romeo’s mustard yellow hat high above his head as Romeo laughed and grabbed at it. The two jostled each other around in the line before Romeo managed to snag his hat back and pull it onto his head. Smiling, Davey wondered what Oscar would think if he saw Morris and Romeo goofing around.

He knew, for his part, that he loved watching Patch and Les goofing around. It warmed his heart to see his brother, who had had his childhood taken away from him far too soon, have a life beyond working for The World. Where every penny counted and every paper was a piece of paper closer to having a roof over his head for the night. It wasn’t a life for a child. Heck, it wasn’t a life for any of them. But what other choice was there?

Taking a step forward in the line, Davey looked back over his shoulder to where Jack and Charlie were speaking with Oscar. His first day out selling with them. Going with Jack for the day, Davey wondered how long the two of them would last before they bit off each other's heads. They were too similar, Davey had realized that quite early on, and there was no way they’d manage to make it a whole day without having at least one argument. Not that it was confusing or hard to sell papers. Not for someone who could speak and hear perfectly fine.

Morris had managed to fit himself right into their lives like he had been there all along. Which wasn’t exactly a lie because the Delancey brothers had always been around and likely would be for a while. Which didn’t actually scare Davey as much as it had at the beginning, oddly enough?

Smiling to himself as he watched Patch and Les laughing about something they’d been talking about, Davey realized that maybe the Delancey brothers actually had changed.

* * *

Lighting a cigar and taking a deep puff from it, Race looked up at the sky and smiled into the sunshine. For the first day in a while, it finally wasn’t snowing and there were no clouds. Watching the smoke swirl up above his head, he heard Romeo and Morris laughing, just a couple groups back in line from him.

He had had his fears about taking in Morris and Oscar. Remembering back to the first day that he’d seen Morris as a newsie - in their lodge - when he’d walked back with Romeo and Crutchie, he’d seriously thought that Jack had lost his mind. Though really, he was pretty sure Jack was still crazy for coming up with this idea in the beginning. But what Jack had decided to do was noble, it was impossible to deny that. And it was so uniquely Jack that it blew Race’s mind.

Race could still remember when Scotty, their old leader, passed away and wrote that he wanted Jack to take over from him. No one questioned it, not for even a second that Scotty knew what he was doing. Because Scotty was the brains of their whole operation and Jack had followed him like a shadow the entire time that Race had known them. At first, he had thought that Jack was Scotty’s little brother. They may not have been related by blood, but Race saw Jack mourning Scotty and saw him hurting like anyone would for a relative.

It only made sense that Jack saw someone hurting, he wanted to help. It was undeniable that even while the Delancey’s seemed fed, at least to a certain extent, while with their uncle and had a roof over their heads, it wasn’t safe at all. Considering what he’d seen underneath Oscar’s clothes, Jack was right to want to protect the brothers. Race was just glad that he’d picked up on it before something bad happened to either of them.

* * *

In the chill of the morning air, Specs was fogging up his glasses with every breath that he took. Standing next to Jack, Crutchie and Oscar, he listened to Jack talking, currently in the process of explaining the basics of selling papers to the blond Delancey. While it seemed that he was paying attention, what fascinated Specs the most was that, as Jack spoke, Oscar seemed to be moving his hands in small movements. Small versions of the signs that he and Morris would speak with. It was almost as if he was so used to translating for his brother that it was just second nature at that point.

Watching the signs and listening to what Jack was saying, Specs could pick out a couple that he recognized. The common ones that Morris would use in what short or clipped conversations they managed to have throughout their days. Though, even then, Specs was finally managing to get more than one or two-word phrases from Morris in the past few days. Once, he even accidentally got through an entire sentence's worth of sign before realizing that Specs had no idea what he was saying. Which, wasn’t exactly true, because now, being around Morris for almost a whole month, it was easy to pick up what he was saying, or trying to say, with his facial expressions, which were becoming more frequent and with exposure.

One of these days, he’d have to ask Oscar or Romeo to teach him. Because now, Romeo knew more signs and was able to hold what seemed like almost entirely full conversations with Morris. Which made Specs’s heart feel warm and full, watching the two boys, one silent and one too cocky for his own good, balancing each other out and both calming each other down and livening each other up. It was like they were meant for each other. Meant to be friends.

“Aint tha’ hard ta sell papes Osca’ Delancey,” Jack said, “youse jus’ needs the right angle. Youse finds tha’, youse hits the jack pot.”

“Aint have ta call me Delancey no more,” Oscar mumbled, “my uncle’s a Delancey, Morris and I aint. Not no more.”

“What if we’s finds youse a nickname,” Specs suggested, “If youse aint likes Osca’ or Delancey no more.”

“Wouldn’t mind,” Oscar replied with a shrug.

“Gots any ideas?” Crutchie asked, though Specs wasn’t entirely sure who he was asking.

* * *

For years, Charlie had been calling him Oscar Delancey and rarely anything else. The last thing that Charlie wanted was a nickname to stick that Oscar wasn’t going to like or going to begin to hate later.

He couldn’t remember when the nickname Crutchie began to stick. It certainly wasn’t right away. For the first little while, they’d all just called him Charlie and only Charlie. Then, they realized just how much money he managed to make from his gimp leg and suddenly ‘Crutchie’ was used way more often.

He wondered if the guys even knew that it bothered him. It hadn’t in the beginning. Specs had glasses, and it didn’t bug him to be called Specs. So Charlie just assumed that he was being oversensitive. Then he accidentally brought it up with Jack one evening up on the rooftop and was reassured that he wasn’t just being ridiculous or overreacting. But Charlie never wanted to be treated any differently than the other guys, so when Jack suggested he asked them to stop calling him Crutchie, Charlie had declined. This was a battle he had to fight on his own terms.

Which was why Charlie wished that Race hadn’t suggested, “Knocker,” just seconds after Charlie finished talking.

The even odder part was that Oscar didn’t seem to mind the name, if the smile on his face and the lack of fidgeting in his hands was anything to go by.

“Knocker,” Jack repeated with a smile, as if he was testing it out before adding, “Stripes and Knocker. Gotta admit, it gots a ring to it.”

“Stripes?” Oscar, or, Charlie supposed, Knocker now, asked.

“Was wha’ we calls Morris back before we’s talked wif ‘im. Didn’t know ‘is name and ‘e always wores a striped shirt.”

“He did love that shirt,” Oscar mumbled as if he was remembering a long lost memory.

* * *

Accepting his biscuit and coffee from the nuns with a smile and a courtesy crossing sign over his chest for good luck, Jack was about to turn and walk away before the nun pulled him aside.

“Good morning Jack Kelly,” the lady said, passing a cup to Race, “everything going okay with you and your boys?”

Jack didn’t know how to answer. He couldn’t remember the last time that he actually had a conversation with one of the ladies that handed out breakfast. Ever since Mother Anne had passed, just weeks after Scotty, Jack had wanted nothing to do with the church other than to accept breakfast from them every morning. Maybe that made him a bad person, but Jack simply found it hard to believe in something that he had no proof actually existed. He knew some of his guys were religious and Jack respected that, but it never really floated his boat.

“Everything’s fine motha,” Jack said, taking a bite of his biscuit and hoping that having a mouthful of bread would prevent her from asking any other questions too soon.

“Those new boys, are they with you?” she asked and suddenly Jack felt his blood run cold. He never once considered what would happen if word got back to Weisel that his nephews were with them. If Weisel went to Trinity Church, was a member of their parish, and someone said something. He wouldn’t let Morris and Oscar get taken away from him. He wouldn’t let any of his guys get taken away from them. They trusted him and they needed him, just as much as he needed every single one of them. They were a family. He wasn't letting that be torn apart.

“Yes motha’,” Jack replied before adding with a coy smile, “they’s Stripes and Knocker.”

* * *

 _“We have to find you a new hat you know,”_ Romeo said when he handed over Morris’s fifty papers outside of the distribution office gates. He’d noticed that Morris’s grey newsie hat was worn almost thin and stained within an inch of its life. And besides, it wasn’t like those kinds of hats were particularly expensive.

 _“Okay. Where am I gonna get one from?”_ Morris asked back, taking the papers and stuffing them into his sack, both of their hands temporarily occupied with organizing their papers for the day.

 _“Chen’s probably. It's a decent store in Chinatown,”_ Romeo replied, taking one of the papers from his sack to leaf through it and deciding what headline would be the best to get Morris to copy, a feat that was getting easier and easier lately with practice and work.

Romeo loved hearing Morris’s voice. Morris’s real voice. Not the one that would slip out when he would get frustrated and accidentally slip back into talking in the one that sounded exactly like Weisel. Because Romeo now knew that nothing said in that voice was what Morris meant. Besides, his real voice was so much nicer. Sweeter and smoother. It was deep but not too deep, with a nice vibrato on some words. Romeo thought that it matched him perfectly. He didn’t think he’d ever get tired of hearing it.

 _“Fire rips through the historic capital of Albany,”_ Romeo said out loud, putting the paper in front of Morris and pointing to the words as he repeated the headline again.

When Morris repeated it, even though it was just a headline, Romeo smiled and looked down at his feet.

He didn’t know how much longer he could keep it a secret. The warm and happy feeling that bubbled up inside his chest anytime that Morris spoke.

* * *

Crossing the Brooklyn Bridge with Race at his side, Spot found his eye being drawn to the top of the Pier 11 crane, yet, not out of fear for the newsie he could see sitting on top of it. Because he believed that this time, he knew that Stripes wouldn’t be falling down off of it onto the pier below.

Smiling into the sun that was threatening to blind them, he bumped into Race’s shoulder teasingly and felt Race bump back into him. With the contact, Spot felt something in his chest settle into place for the first time. He realized he was exactly where he needed to be and where he wanted to be. Nothing was out of place and everything seemed to be going right, not falling apart and not holding on by a thread.

With a snort, Spot realized that yeah, Jack was right.

He always was.

They’d be okay.

This time, Spot believed it.

Looking over his shoulder at the Pier 11 crane once again, Spot couldn’t help but feel proud of the young boy who couldn’t speak yet who’d managed to find his voice within the ranks of the Lower Manhattan Newsies.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) I am getting emotional writing this. When I started, life was a whole lot different and I don't think that I could have ever, in a million years have pictured it to look like how it does now and this story has gotten me through a lot of it. There have been ups and downs, but now, 35 chapters later, things look a whole lot different and I think this chapter reflects that in a way.
> 
> 2) I am grateful for everyone who took the time to open this book and read it, leave kudos or leave comments. If you've made it this far, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for taking the time to read it because, damn, this is the longest thing I've ever written. 
> 
> 3) I will be continuing this story in the style of one-shots, like the rest of this series, so check back from time to time and maybe there will be something new in the fictional stories and lives of Morris, Romeo and the rest of the newsies. 
> 
> 4) For your very last Youtube Of The Day, I present to you, something very special that I have been saving for this exact moment. I wanted the last Youtube Of The Day to be special, and I think this one is very special...  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvI84oVuivI&list=PLFxtUQRT3x4LNwb8fUpEMOnIgAbFGFlRj&index=45&t=0s
> 
> 4.5) And, just in case...here is Mike Faist as Jack Kelly, doing Seize the Day (yes, I know I've posted it before, but I love it so much I had to post it again...  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cclbMBLrq7Y&list=PLFxtUQRT3x4LNwb8fUpEMOnIgAbFGFlRj&index=33
> 
> Until next time, stay safe y'all  
> MRT, signing off  
> <3

**Author's Note:**

> Stripes is the Mike Faist newsie character (when he isn't actively being Morris Delancey). I know that both characters do sing in the show (I think he may even have a line or two while he's his newsie but I'm not totally sure) but in this, the character (Morris/Stripes) has severe Combined Expressive/Receptive Language Processing Disorder (meaning that he can't understand what people are saying very well and he can't speak very well either, but can read and write) and gets very frustrated and jittery as a result. More info can be found at: https://www.additudemag.com/language-processing-disorders-recognizing-symptoms/


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